Parents' health and demographic characteristics predict noncompliance with well-child visits.
BACKGROUND
The purpose of this study was to investigate factors related to well-child visit noncompliance in an ethnically diverse family practice clinic population.


METHODS
Participants included 146 parents (131 mothers and 15 fathers) of children aged 0 to 24 months who received care at a St. Paul residency clinic. Participants completed telephone surveys that asked about their demographic characteristics, attitudes toward well-child visits, whether the most recent planned well-child visit had been kept, and their own and their child's health characteristics.


RESULTS
All participants thought that well-child visits were important, with immunizations being the highest rated reason for importance. Fourteen percent of parents said they had missed a recent well-child visit, mostly because they forgot. More than three fourths of parents believed visit reminders were helpful, and the preferred type of reminder was a telephone call. Noncompliance with well-child visits was associated with the parent's depressive symptoms, transportation difficulties, working at a job, having private (vs public) health insurance, and being older (vs younger).


CONCLUSIONS
These results suggest that well-child visit compliance might be enhanced by visit reminders and improved access to transportation. The relationship of well-child visit noncompliance to parental depressive symptoms, if verified in other populations, points to a need for greater surveillance of children/families who do not schedule or keep well-child visits.
Jhanjee
Ishani
I
Department of Family Practice and Community Health, University of Minnesota Medical School, Minneapolis, USA.
Saxeena
Deepti
D
Arora
Jaspal
J
Gjerdingen
Dwenda K
DK
D003710:Demography; D003863:Depression / Q000208:ethnology / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D009819:Office Visits / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010290:Parents / Q000523:psychology*; D011320:Primary Health Care / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D011446:Prospective Studies; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D016312:Treatment Refusal / Q000208:ethnology* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data