RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Caregiver and Clinician Perspectives on Missed Well-Child Visits
JF The Annals of Family Medicine
JO Ann Fam Med
FD American Academy of Family Physicians
SP 30
OP 34
DO 10.1370/afm.2466
VO 18
IS 1
A1 Elizabeth R. Wolf
A1 Jennifer O’Neil
A1 James Pecsok
A1 Rebecca S. Etz
A1 Douglas J. Opel
A1 Richard Wasserman
A1 Alex H. Krist
YR 2020
UL http://www.annfammed.org/content/18/1/30.abstract
AB PURPOSE Despite the benefits of well-child care visits, up to one-half of these visits are missed. Little is known about why children miss them, so we undertook a qualitative study to elucidate these factors.METHODS We interviewed 17 caregivers whose children had missed well-child visits and 6 clinicians, focusing on 3 areas: the value of well-child visits, barriers to attendance, and facilitators of attendance. Transcripts were analyzed with a grounded theory approach and thematic analysis.RESULTS Caregivers and clinicians identified similar important aspects of well-child visits: immunizations, detection of disease, and monitoring of growth and development. Both groups identified similar barriers to attendance: transportation, difficulty taking time off from work, child care, and other social stressors.CONCLUSIONS Further work to explore how addressing social determinants of health might improve attendance of well-child visits is needed.