Guidelines for Submission
The 12th Health Survey Research Methods Conference (HSRMC) will continue the series that began 50 years ago, in 1975, to discuss innovative survey research methods that improve the quality of health survey data. The next conference will be held in Williamsburg, VA from March 4-7, 2025.
This call seeks abstracts for papers to be presented at the conference, including: general overview papers that summarize and integrate current knowledge, papers that identify and address future research challenges, innovative theoretical essays, and other papers that describe new empirical research that advances the field of survey methods and their application to health-related issues.
Conference Overview
At the 10th HSRMC in 2011, Jack Fowler offered a brief history of the HSRMC series, noting that:
"The most important function of this conference is to remind those who collect and disseminate health data that methods matter… This conference brings together those who think the most about survey error and provides an environment in which they can talk together for almost three days about what they know and how methodology affects the confidence we can have in our data… The point is to collect good quality data that accurately informs us about issues that matter."
The HSRMC series is distinct from many other conferences in that it brings together researchers from the forefront of survey methods research, who are responsible for the design, implementation and analysis of major health surveys, and who use survey data to develop health policy. Attendance is limited and the conference is entirely in plenary session. All attendees are expected to stay for the entire conference and to actively participate in the discussions. Floor discussion is an important part of the conference, and there are invited rapporteurs whose job is specifically to capture the discussion. Additionally, presenters will have the opportunity to publish their work in Research in Social and Administrative Pharmacy or in Survey Practice.
We invite interested researchers to submit abstracts that combine both methods and substantive topics relevant to the conference. Most abstracts for this conference should be relevant to at least one area in both the methods and topics column from the table below. For examples of papers and proceedings from previous conferences, see the conference website.
Methods
Data collection methods
- Questionnaire design and pretesting
- Survey modes and mixed-mode data collection
- Respondent contact methods (QR codes, texting, others)
- Auxiliary data collection (e.g., biomarkers, cognitive assessments, wearables, etc.)
- Direct measures of respondent behaviors or characteristics
- Responsive or adaptive design
- Use of incentives
- Interviewer training
- Privacy and confidentiality
- Use of proxy respondents
- Surveys of health practices, hospitals, and other institutions
- Cross-national survey methods
Post data collection methods
- Combining survey data with non-survey/EHR/web-scraped/administrative data
- Machine learning, natural language processing, AI
Sampling and weighting methods
- Non-probability and probability panels
- Use of social media for survey sampling
- Sampling rare subgroups or vulnerable populations
- Response rate/non-response bias
- Weighting methods
Other survey methods
Topics
Health care coverage, access, and delivery
- Health insurance coverage
- Government health programs
- Health care costs and affordability
- Health equity and disparities (racial/ethnic, gender, geographic, other)
- Health care workforce issues (including burnout, provider consolidation)
- Telehealth, electronic medical records, data privacy
- Home-based health care and home caregiving
- Value-based purchasing
Public health, medicine, disease, treatment
- COVID-19 and other respiratory illnesses
- Pandemic preparedness
- Prescription drugs
- Opioids and substance use disorders
- Health effects of climate change
- Disability
- Obesity
- Alzheimer's, dementia, and other age-related conditions
- Mental health and wellbeing
- Maternal and infant health
- Vaccinations
Emerging issues
- Use of AI in health care
- Genetics and precision medicine
- Health misinformation
Other topics
Guidelines for Submission
To submit a paper for consideration, upload a 500-1,000 word abstract here. You will need to create an account, and the system will guide you through the submission process.
All abstracts must be submitted online between April 1 and June 30, 2024. Submitted abstracts will be reviewed by the HSRMC steering committee.
For more information, please contact Edward Kelly at edwardkelly@westat.com