title: Factors affecting the non-compliance for follow-up in very low birth weight children.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Long-term longitudinal follow up of very low birth weight (VLBW, birth weight < or =1500 g) infants is important. This study assessed the factors affecting non-compliance for follow-up at different ages in VLBW children.
  
  
  METHODS
  The demographic data, morbidity and neurodevelopmental data of 321 VLBW infants were analyzed between those returned and not returned.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The majority of the children who did not attend the follow-up clinic were caused by inaccessibility, and refusal by the parents. The non-compliant children had higher rate of multiple births, short paternal education years, mother being a housewife, and lower incidence of first child, emergent caesarian section and small for gestational age. They did not differ much from the children returned in the occurrence of neonatal diseases. No significant difference of the growth and neurodevelopmental status at the previous visit could be observed between children of the two groups. When data of different follow-up visits were compared, it was noted that the most common reason for not attending the follow-up visits was inaccessibility for the 6- and 12-month visits and refusal by the parents for other visits. Multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed that variable(s) increasing the non-compliance were none for the 6-month visit, severe retinopathy of prematurity for the 12-month visit, short duration of paternal education for the 18-, 24- and 36-month visits and multiple births for the 36-month visit.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results showed that the reasons and the affecting variables for not attending the follow-up assessment were different for different age groups.
authors.affiliation: College of Medicine, Fu Jen Catholic University, Taipei Hsien 24205, Taiwan. 049687@mail.fju.edu.tw
authors.forename: Kuo-Inn
authors.initials: KI
authors.lastname: Tsou
authors.forename: Chyong-Hsin
authors.initials: CH
authors.lastname: Hsu
authors.forename: Li-Jung
authors.initials: LJ
authors.lastname: Fang
authors.forename: Kuo-Su
authors.initials: KS
authors.lastname: Tsou
authors.forename: Suh-Fang
authors.initials: SF
authors.lastname: Jeng
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D019102:Infant, Very Low Birth Weight; D016015:Logistic Models; D008297:Male; D010349:Patient Compliance; D012044:Regression Analysis