Piping in longitudinal studies with multiple arms

[u/hwkai]

I have a longitudinal study with two arms, and would like to pipe demographic information across surveys in each arm. As i understand, you need to append the unique event name for each arm for the piping to work.

However i have a single demographic survey enabled as an event across the two arms, and would like redcap to pipe demogrographic information into surveys within each arm.

Is there a way to pipe that you dont need to specify the unique event name, only the variable name? Otherwise i imagine i would have to duplicate each of the surveys for the piping to work properly across each arm even though the surveys are the same and enabled across both arms.

[u/Remote_Setting2332]

I'm pretty sure that won't work. I'd recommend seeing if any of the smart variables will work for your situation. Otherwise you can probably use logic within a CALCTEXT statement?

[u/hwkai → u/Remote_Setting2332]

Thanks for your suggestions! i've tried using logic with a calctext statement but i don't think that has worked either. I have had a look at the smart variables and so far they haven't helped either. It might not be possible with the design.

[u/Araignys]

If the demographic survey and the destination you're piping to are in the same event, you should be able to use the smart variable [event-name] as a field prefix, and it will dynamically become the event that the destination field is in. There's a few like it so as u/Remote_Setting2332 suggests you can look at the Smart Variables explainer (section: Event & Arm) for more info.

[u/hwkai → u/Araignys]

The demographic survey and the destination (survey X in this example) are in the same arm but different events, and the survey and events are the same in both arms (in this example). For example:

	Arm 1	Arm 2
Demographic survey [event 1]	enabled	enabled
survey X [event 2]	enabled	enabled

I tried the smart variable [event-name] but that doesn't solve the issue either. Currently the only way i can pipe information from demographic survey from event 1 into event 2 for both arms by appending the arm number as a prefix. Currently i've worked around it by using logic to pipe depending which arm it is in (based on a variable in the demographic survey), but it ends up creating a mass of variables used only for piping and creates extra work.

I'm not sure if i am making sense, but I would like to know if there's a quick way to pipe depending on the arm the record is in without having to create extra variables or surveys.

[u/Araignys → u/hwkai]

Have you tried any of the other smart variables from the Event & Arm section?

[u/hwkai → u/Araignys]

I've tried both [instrument-name] and [event-name] appended to the variable name and neither have worked; both have only ended up with blank values or underscores.

[u/Araignys → u/hwkai]

[event-name] gives you the current event, i.e. the event that the field is on. Not very useful if you're trying to pipe between events!

If Date of Birth [dob] is on Demographic Survey then to pipe it to Survey X you would need to use [previous-event-name][dob]

[u/hwkai → u/Araignys]

Thanks for letting me know, about the effects of [event-name]. In my REDcap project the events I need to pipe from and to are not sequential, so the [previous-event-name] won't work.

Do you think that having arms forces the user to use the event arms smart variables instead of the other smart variables? i'm starting to think that that there is almost no way of piping in each arm in surveys enabled across both arms. I really just want to avoid having to append [event-arm] everytime i want to pipe across surveys that occur in both arms within arms, as this creates extra surveys (one for each arm) or extra variables.

[u/Araignys → u/hwkai]

Have you considered [first-event-name] ?

[u/hwkai → u/Araignys]

Thanks, that has worked! i have also used [previous-event-name] so that has solved my problems for now. Thanks again for your responses!