Selected Quotations on the Value of Well-Child Visits
| Participant and Theme | Code Definition | Quotation |
|---|---|---|
| Caregiver | ||
| Vaccines | Immunizations, vaccinations, or “shots” | “She needs her check-ups to let me know if she’s sick or if everything’s okay, what shots she needs, make sure she is able to go to school.” “Some of those vaccines that she gets, it helps prevent other kids from getting sick.” |
| Growth and development | Monitoring of growth; monitoring of verbal, gross, or fine motor development, or development in general | “It’s reassurance for me that he was on track developmentally and socially, and hitting all of the milestones that I know he needs to be hitting at this point.” |
| Health promotion | Counseling in social, behavioral, dietary, or dental domains | “You’re looking at, you know, developmental habits. You know, do they have a television in their bedroom or are they drinking a ton of juice and rotting their teeth out.” |
| Literacy promotion | Encouragement of reading or other literacy skills | “I also like the new theme of how they allow the child to take a book home. Um, it promotes that healthy relationship and that ongoing relationship with not only the facility and the child, but also when the physician sees a child with a book, they can mention it.” |
| Detection of illness | Detection of acute or chronic illness through history, physical examination, laboratory tests, or imaging | “Obviously if there is something more severe it’s normally caught at well visits; if it’s caught early, if not, then it’s caught during an emergent visit because it’s gone on too long.” “He can check for anything that could be wrong or going wrong.” |
| Language | Communication with clinician or staff; use of non-English language or interpretation | “I like to bring my son to the clinic because they speak in Spanish and understand me well.” |
| Clinician | ||
| Vaccines | Immunizations, vaccinations, or “shots” | “I think that part of the big incentive for a lot of families—so I think one of the reasons that they do make it, rather than that they don’t make it—so, the reason that they can’t get there, there are lots of them; but I think one of the key reasons is that it comes down to shots and the fact that the public school system requires vaccines. So that essentially created an extra incentive, an extra incentive for parents to make and keep well-check appointments because they couldn’t get their shots otherwise.” |
| Growth and development | Monitoring of growth; monitoring of verbal, gross, or fine motor development, or development in general | “Pretty much growth and development for most kids is where we’re going to focus.” |