Comparing recruitment strategies in a study of acupuncture for chronic back pain

Table 3 Additional baseline characteristics of study population by randomization group and recruitment method

	Acupuncture		Usual care		Total
	Mailed	Magazine	Mailed	Magazine	Mailed	Magazine
	Letter	Ad	Letter	Ad	Letter	Ad	p for
	(n = 150)	(n = 85)	(n = 46)	(n = 31)	(n = 196)	(n = 116)	difference*
Back pain: satisfaction with prior care and some concurrent treatments
Medication use in past week, %	67	64	72	65	68	64	0.43
Satisfaction with care: overall, %							0.002
Very or somewhat satisfied	45	32	39	39	43	34
Not satisfied or dissatisfied	51	53	59	52	53	53
Missing	4	15	2	10	4	14
At least moderately agree will try to manage back pain by self in future, %	23	20	17	23	22	21	0.80
Back exercise in past week:
% any	66	69	59	71	64	70	0.32
mean (SD) number of days	2.5 (2.4)	2.5 (2.4)	2.3 (2.4)	3.0 (2.6)	2.5 (2.4)	2.6 (2.4)	0.47
median number of days	2.0	2.0	2.0	3.0	2.0	2.0
Active exercise in past week:
% any	73	84	80	74	74	81	0.18
mean (SD) number of days	2.6 (2.2)	3.3 (2.2)	2.8 (1.9)	2.8 (2.3)	2.6 (2.1)	3.2 (2.2)	0.03
median number of days	2.0	3.0	3.0	2.0	3.0	3.0
Treatment expectations, preferences, and knowledge
Expectation of helpfulness of acupuncture, mean (SD) (0-10 scale) (based on non-missing data)	6.3 (1.8)	6.6 (1.8)	7.0 (1.7)	6.9 (1.8)	6.5 (1.8)	6.6 (1.8)	0.44
Preferred treatment, %							0.29
Acupuncture	25	37	33	36	28	38
Other CAM	43	38	33	32	42	38
Conventional	25	20	33	26	28	23
Other/Unknown	7	6	2	7	1	2
Any knowledge of acupuncture, %	32	38	33	48	32	41	0.13
Told about acupuncture effectiveness, %							0.33
Very effective	27	34	30	23	28	31
Less than very effective	32	31	22	42	30	34
Unknown	41	35	48	36	42	35
Impression of acupuncture, %							0.17
Very positive	21	25	22	23	21	24
Moderately positive	28	42	44	32	32	40
Negative or Slightly positive	51	33	35	45	47	36

ISSN: 1471-2288