The first 6 steps
for successful
questionnaire
design
Designing a health survey questionnaire whether it’s for
clinical or market research is more than simply writing some
questions expecting survey participants to understand them
and provide reliable and relevant answers.
Designing a health survey questionnaire requires initiating a relationship
with your participants that stimulates their interest and encourages
them to provide the best answers possible. It’s also knowing what your
research question is.
Collecting information using a survey questionnaire to measure patient
outcomes, satisfaction, experience and health is now common practice.
There is a variety of questionnaire types that can be used. Whichever
way survey questionnaires are used and for whatever purpose, the same
design rules should apply in their construction to ensure that they are
appropriate for the intended use and provide reliable and valid data.
2. Getting participant input
This is an essential part of survey questionnaire design
to ensure that its content is based around the health
1. Start at the end
Without a clear aim as to the purpose of the
survey it will not be possible to identify the
information required and how it will be
managed. Tailoring the content to meet the aims of
the survey ideally includes undertaking of a small-
scale qualitative study to identify the range of
behaviours, attitudes and issues relevant to the
objectives of the survey.
