(P165) PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF TWO INTERNET-BASED PARTICIPANT RECRUITMENT PLATFORMS IN A RANDOMIZED CLINICAL TRIAL FOR HIV TESTING AND LINKAGE-TO-CARE

Background:
To prevent new infections, it is important to identify and provide linkage to HIV care for persons with HIV (PWH) and to link persons with risk factors for HIV to pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP).  We report on two internet recruitment platforms used to reach people in a randomized clinical trial of linkage to care and PrEP.

Methods:
Participants were recruited through an academic institution’s in-house social media campaign (SMC) and a commercial internet recruitment platform (CIRP). SMC displayed ads to Facebook and Instagram users ≤25-years in the Baltimore-metropolitan area based on profile information. CIRP used machine-learning and data mining algorithms to search digital footprints using predetermined inclusion and exclusion criteria, using advertisements on social media sites and search engines, e.g., Google, Meta, TikTok. Viewers of both platforms completed an online screening form, CIRP automatically pre-screened leads based on select eligibility criteria; study coordinators screened and invited eligible persons to the study site. Platform-generated study analytics were used to evaluate each platform’s enrollment performance over their first 5 months post-launch.

Results:
From 01/2022 to 05/2022, SMC generated 177 (100%) leads; 121 (68%) were contacted, 49 (27%) were eligible, and 34 (19%) were enrolled in the study; 1 (1%) were out-of-care PWH. From 09/15/2023 to 02/07/2024, CIRP generated 462 study leads; of which, 123 were deemed ineligible by automatic response screening. Of the 339 (100%) remaining leads, 262 (77%) were contacted, 86 (25%) were eligible, and 49 (14%) were enrolled; 7 (2%) were out-of-care PWH. On average, CIRP generated about 10 enrollees/month while SMC generated 7 enrollees/month.

Conclusion:
Non-internet-based recruitment of study participants is time- and labor-intensive; machine-learning platform may be more effective in increasing study enrollments/month compared with traditional advertising on social media platforms.