2025/05/29 by Andrea Ivanovska, Michael Bošnjak, Vasja Vehovar · 1 voice
Social Sciences · Psychology · #Survey Methodology and Nonresponse #Behavioral Health and Interventions
paper · pdf · doi:10.33700/jhrs.4.1.137
openalex publication_date 2025/05/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/14
Introduction: Health surveys require the highest data quality, especially when they inform public health policies. With recent technological developments, probability-based online panels (PBOPs) are becoming an attractive cost-effective alternative to traditional surveys. They are also beginning to be used for official health statistics. However, PBOPs still face concerns about bias, especially for health-related estimates. Method: Using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) approach, we conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis of PBOP PBOP health survey data quality, with relative bias (RB) of the estimates as the effect size. We analysed 137 health-related survey items from 14 studies and used a linear regression model to examine factors that moderate RB. Results: The RB varied considerably across the subjects, and its overall median was 12.7%. The highest RBs were exhibited by disabilities (23.6%), mental illnesses (23.2%), personal mental health conditions (20.8%) and drug use (20.7%), and the lowest, by doctor’s treatment (2.24%). The measurement levels with ordinal scales (25.8%) showed higher RB, and certain country effects were also observed. Conclusion: This moderate bias of the health estimates raises concerns about the accuracy of PBOP estimates regarding sensitive health topics. Therefore, PBOP should be used cautiously for official health statistics; and when designing PBOP surveys for health subjects, the item and study characteristics should be included as methodological considerations.