Reprint requests for family medicine literature: how do we respond?

Requesting and sending reprints of articles published in the medical literature is an established tradition. This survey of authors of family medicine literature found that 54% believed the tradition should be continued, and 43% felt reprints meet a real need. The authors responded to 90% of the requests. Those authors who paid the cost out of their own pockets were significantly more likely to view reprints as useful and more likely to respond to requests. Support for innovative ways of disseminating information, ways that may meet needs that reprints do not, is potentially available.