Recruiting Partners of Veterans with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder for Survey Research: Feasibility, Response Rate, and Representativeness

Recruiting Partners of Veterans with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder for Survey Research: Feasibility, Response Rate, and Representativeness

Intimate partners of veterans diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be instrumental in the veterans’ PTSD recovery. Despite interest from both veterans and their significant others for greater partner involvement in Veterans Affairs (VA) treatment and services, significant challenges exist to engage partners directly for research, education or therapeutic activities. Furthermore, initiatives aimed at reaching a large, representative group of veterans’ intimate partners are unlikely to achieve sufficient sample size through direct contact with veterans or their significant others alone.