Barriers and facilitators to participating in Alzheimer's disease biomarker research in black and white older adults.

Introduction: The study examined Black and White prospective participants' views of barriers to and facilitators of participation in Alzheimer's disease (AD) biomarker research. Methods: In a mixed-methods study, 399 community-dwelling Black and White older adults (age ≥55) who had never participated in AD research completed a survey about their perceptions of AD biomarker research. Individuals from lower socioeconomic and education backgrounds and Black men were over-sampled to address perspectives of traditionally under-represented groups. A subset of participants (n = 29) completed qualitative interviews. Results: Most participants expressed interest in biomarker research (overall 69%). However, Black participants were comparatively more hesitant than White participants (28.9% vs 15.1%), were more concerned about study risks (28.9% vs 15.1%), and perceived multiple barriers to participating in brain scans. These results persisted even after adjusting for trust and perceived knowledge of AD. Information was a primary barrier (when absent) and incentive (when provided) for AD biomarker research participation. Black older adults desired more information about AD (eg, risk, prevention), general research processes, and specific biomarker procedures. They also desired return of results to make informed decisions about their health, research-sponsored community awareness events, and for researchers to mitigate the burden placed on participants in research (eg, transportation, basic needs). Conclusion: Our findings increase representativeness in the literature by focusing on individuals with no history of AD research experience and those from traditionally underrepresented groups in research. Results suggest that the research community needs to improve information sharing and raising awareness, increase their presence in the communities of underrepresented groups, reduce incidental costs, and provide valuable personal health information to participants to increase interest. Specific recommendations for improving recruitment are addressed. Future studies will assess the implementation of evidence-based, socioculturally sensitive recruitment strategies to increase enrollment of Black older adults into AD biomarker studies.HIGHLIGHTS: Individuals from under-represented groups are interested in Alzheimer's disease (AD) biomarker research.After adjusting for trust and AD knowledge, Black participants were still more hesitant.Information is a barrier (when absent) to and incentive (when given) for biomarker studies.Reducing burden (e.g., transportation) is essential for recruiting Black older adults.

Accelerating diversity in Alzheimer's disease research by partnering with a community advisory board.

Introduction: Community advisory boards (CABs) and researcher partnerships present a promising opportunity to accelerate enrollment of underrepresented groups (URGs). We outline the framework for how the CAB and researchers at the Indiana Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (IADRC) partnered to accelerate URG participation in AD neuroimaging research. Methods: CAB and the IADRC researchers partnered to increase the CAB's impact on URG study enrollment through community and research interactions. Community interactions included the CAB collaboratively building a network of URG focused community organizations and collaborating with those URG-focused organizations to host IADRC outreach and recruitment events. Research interactions included direct impact (CAB members referring themselves or close contacts as participants) and strategic impact, mainly by the CAB working with researchers to develop and refine URG focused outreach and recruitment strategies for IADRC and affiliated studies to increase URG representation. We created a database infrastructure to measure how these interactions impacted URG study enrollment. Results: Out of the 354 URG research referrals made to the IADRC between October 2019 and December 2022, 267 referrals were directly referred by the CAB (N = 36) or from community events in which CAB members organized and/or volunteered at (N = 231). Out of these 267 referrals, 34 were enrolled in IADRC and 2 were enrolled in Indiana University Longitudinal Early Onset AD Study (IU LEADS). Of note, both studies require the prospective participants to be willing to do MRI and PET scans. As of December 2022, 30 out of the 34 enrolled participants have received a consensus diagnosis; the majority were cognitively normal (64.7%), with the remainder having mild cognitive impairment (17.6%) or early-stage AD (2.9%). Discussion: The IADRC CAB-researcher partnership had a measurable impact on the enrollment of African American/Black adults in AD neuroimaging studies. Future studies will need to test whether this conceptual model works for other sites and for other URGs.