Consent Forms in Cancer Research: Examining the Effect of Length on Readability

September 28, 2023 updated by: Mayo Clinic
Researchers are using mock consent forms to see if wordiness has any effect on patients' understanding and willingness to sign up for a cancer clinical trial.

Study Overview

Detailed Description

This study will determine whether there is a relationship between wordiness of a consent form and whether or not the consent form helped the patient decide to enroll in a clinical trial. This study will also determine whether wordiness of a consent form is associated with patients' willingness to sign the consent form.

Study Type

Interventional

Enrollment (Actual)

266

Phase

  • Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

This section provides the contact details for those conducting the study, and information on where this study is being conducted.

Study Contact

Study Locations

    • Minnesota
      • Rochester, Minnesota, United States, 55905
        • Mayo Clinic in Rochester

Participation Criteria

Researchers look for people who fit a certain description, called eligibility criteria. Some examples of these criteria are a person's general health condition or prior treatments.

Eligibility Criteria

Ages Eligible for Study

18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)

Accepts Healthy Volunteers

No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

  • Patient-reported history of cancer
  • Patient is able to read English
  • Patient-reported age of 18 years or older

Exclusion Criteria:

  • None

Study Plan

This section provides details of the study plan, including how the study is designed and what the study is measuring.

How is the study designed?

Design Details

  • Primary Purpose: Other
  • Allocation: Randomized
  • Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
  • Masking: Triple

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm
Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: 6,000 word consent form
Subjects who are receiving cancer therapy or have been treated for cancer in the past will be asked to review a mock consent form of approximately 6,000 words.
Mock consent form with consistent content in approximately 6,000 word length.
Experimental: 4,000 word consent form
Subjects who are receiving cancer therapy or have been treated for cancer in the past will be asked to review a mock consent form of approximately 4,000 words.
Mock consent form with consistent content in approximately 4,000 word length.
Experimental: 2,000 word consent form
Subjects who are receiving cancer therapy or have been treated for cancer in the past will be asked to review a mock consent form of approximately 2,000 words.
Mock consent form with consistent content in approximately 2,000 word length.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure
Measure Description
Time Frame
Decision to enroll
Time Frame: Through study completion, approximately 1 hour
Number of participants to indicate on the self-reported patient questionnaire that the information provided in the consent form helped make a decision about whether or not to enroll in the trial. This is defined as a response of 1 or 2 on the Likert scale of 1=strongly agree and 5= strongly disagree for information in the consent form was helpful to the decision to join the study.
Through study completion, approximately 1 hour

Collaborators and Investigators

This is where you will find people and organizations involved with this study.

Sponsor

Investigators

  • Principal Investigator: Aminah Jatoi, MD, Mayo Clinic

Publications and helpful links

The person responsible for entering information about the study voluntarily provides these publications. These may be about anything related to the study.

Study record dates

These dates track the progress of study record and summary results submissions to ClinicalTrials.gov. Study records and reported results are reviewed by the National Library of Medicine (NLM) to make sure they meet specific quality control standards before being posted on the public website.

Study Major Dates

Study Start (Actual)

September 8, 2020

Primary Completion (Estimated)

July 4, 2024

Study Completion (Estimated)

November 4, 2024

Study Registration Dates

First Submitted

September 9, 2020

First Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 9, 2020

First Posted (Actual)

September 14, 2020

Study Record Updates

Last Update Posted (Actual)

September 29, 2023

Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria

September 28, 2023

Last Verified

September 1, 2023

More Information

Terms related to this study

Other Study ID Numbers

  • 20-007236

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?

NO

Drug and device information, study documents

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product

No

Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product

No

This information was retrieved directly from the website clinicaltrials.gov without any changes. If you have any requests to change, remove or update your study details, please contact register@clinicaltrials.gov. As soon as a change is implemented on clinicaltrials.gov, this will be updated automatically on our website as well.

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