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Wednesday, 20 October 2004

This presentation is part of: Poster Session - Utility Theory; Health Economics; Patient & Physician Preferences; Simulation; Technology Assessment

WHAT WOULD MAKE THE SOCIETY AND THE ANNUAL MEETING BETTER? A SURVEY OF THE SOCIETY FOR MEDICAL DECISION MAKING MEMBERSHIP

Murray Krahn, MD, MSc, University Health Network, Department of Medicine, Toronto, ON, Canada, Maciej Witkos, MSc, University Health Network, Medicine, Toronto, ON, Canada, Gillian D. Sanders, PhD, Duke, Medicine, Durham, NC, David Sugano, DPh, Schering Plough Inc., Global Health Outcomes and Economics, Kenilworth, NJ, and Scott B. Cantor, PhD, The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Biostatistics & Applied Mathematics, Houston, TX.

Purpose: The Board of Trustees of the Society for Medical Decision Making (SMDM) commissioned a survey to assess member attitudes in order to guide planning for future annual meetings, broaden the membership and enhance the Society’s relevance.

Methods: We generated survey items by soliciting selected board members’ opinions regarding attributes that might improve the attractiveness of the meeting and the Society. The survey involved 54 questions about meeting attendance, content and quality of previous meetings, attitudes toward the Society, and factors which would improve meeting attendance. E-mails soliciting participation in the web-based survey were sent to the Society membership on three occasions over 4 weeks. We employed descriptive statistics, and stratified analyses by demographic characteristics to analyze the results, as well as compiling free text responses by theme.

Results: 297 of 918 members (32%) responded. In comparison with Society members, more survey respondents were women (40% vs. 31%, p=0.0023), and fewer physicians (44% vs. 51%, p =0.05). Most respondents were between 30 – 45 years old (57%), male (60%), from the US (79%), and have an academic primary affiliation (80%). Responders ‘strongly agreed’ that the meeting is scientifically useful (75%), fun (47%), and aligns with their research interests (49%). 58% of responders ‘strongly agreed’ that they strongly support the Society. 58% and 47% ‘strongly/ somewhat’ agreed that their support is increasing with time, and the Society is their primary affiliation, respectively. Physicians stated they were more likely to attend if the meeting was more clinically relevant (p = 0.0005). Members from outside North America would be more likely to come the meeting if they had to travel less (p = 0.0009). The most frequent free text comments about the meeting were that it should be more practical, policy, and clinically relevant (25), it is great as is (16), should be less expensive (15) and better structured for networking (14). The most frequent comments about the Society were that it should be more practical, policy, and clinically relevant (20), and more inclusive/open (15).

Conclusions: Members in general, have a positive attitude towards the SMDM and the annual meeting. Issues of relevance, high cost, and inclusiveness were the predominant issues identified by the survey responders and will be targets of the current board and meeting chairs.


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