Throughout my 30+ year career designing forms, professional documents, and data collection instruments, I have acquired a substantial knowledge base and skill set to be able to understand and accommodate the full range of client needs, from researching validated data collection methods and measures for applicability, to designing forms that are professionally formatted, easy to complete and are tailored to the target sample, to creating elegant promotional materials, to completing grant applications, to mastering online survey platforms including applying advanced branching logic, pre-population of variables, participant management and results reporting.

My approach entails working closely with clients/teams to establish the feasible goals of the project and iteratively provide feedback and receive updates through multiple revision rounds. The development and revision process is tailored to client preferences relating to the scope and depth of recommended revisions, the role and extent of team member participation, the most convenient and expeditious communication method, and the project timeline and budget.

My experience as a forms/data collection instrument developer began in the mid-1990s when I established a consultative business that provided materials development and survey/data collection conduct services. I continued this role throughout my career with VA, creating and consulting on forms, questionnaires, and other data collection instruments/tools used in healthcare research. Click here for a complete list of healthcare projects I have worked on.

As a survey developer, I assisted research investigators in developing data collection instruments including surveys/questionnaires, interview guides, abstraction tools, and rating forms, providing expert consultation on question wording, validity, intent, redundancy, flow, layout, design, length, burden, bias, and clarity. The work required identifying data collection needs, reviewing draft instruments for pitfalls and limitations, understanding the knowledge base of the target recipients, and ascertaining the most effective format for ease of completion.

My services extended to both research teams and approval/compliance departments (human subjects protections (IRB) and privacy compliance), the latter of which involved creating and updating all forms used in IRB submissions at the Greater Los Angeles VA, such as complex applications (click here to view example–note that the hover text is not enabled), non-compliance reports, regulatory documents and drug forms, as well as those used by Coordinators and IRB Reviewers (e.g., worksheets, checklists, outcome reports). I also created and presented the new forms and procedures including online tools, decision trees, flowcharts, guidance documents, and internal surveys, through formal webinars to the VA Greater Los Angeles research community, and routinely trained individual team members on form completion so that future submissions would require minimal revisions.

While my expertise and experience lie soundly in healthcare research my survey/document design services can be applied to other topic areas and purposes. In addition, I have ample proficiency in arts grant application completion, graphic design, and general editing.