Working with People Affected by Cancer in Food Safety Research: Recruitment Considerations from a Transatlantic Collaboration

In July 2022, a memorandum of understanding was signed between food safety researchers from the ZERO2FIVE Food Industry Centre at Cardiff Metropolitan University, UK, and the College of Education and Human Ecology at The Ohio State University, USA. The transatlantic agreement relates to behavioral food safety research most often focusing on vulnerable consumer groups that is being conducted by the two institutions. Despite recruitment procedures being described in the methods sections of food safety behavioral studies, the challenges faced by researchers in recruiting participants are seldom shared. Because issues experienced with recruitment and solutions to overcome such issues are not shared, it can be difficult for researchers to foresee challenges and predict recruitment obstacles when building study design, which can negatively impact research progression. As researchers that have experienced such issues, we acknowledge the importance of sharing the lessons learned in this research area. Therefore, in this general interest article, we share our experiences of recruiting people receiving chemotherapy for the treatment of cancer in the United States and the United Kingdom for food safety behavioral research, we describe the participant recruitment challenges that we have faced, and we share the approaches that we have used to overcome these challenges.