Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

10-2024

Abstract

Background: This study aimed to identify behavioral factors that affect patient attendance in outpatient clinics, especially those related to rescheduling. Methods: A retrospective study was conducted on 20,386 appointment records for 6,252 patients in an outpatient specialty clinic at a women’s and children’s hospital in Singapore over 34 months (January 2012–October 2014). Multivariate logistic regression was used to analyze the influence of independent variables on appointment no-shows. Results: The average no-show rate of the study population was 28.87%. Patient historical behaviors were significantly associated with appointment attendance. In particular, a larger number of previous visits, more historical no-shows, more historical rescheduling events initiated by patients, and more reschedulings initiated by the clinic for the current appointment were positively associated with no-shows. Notably, the number of previous visits was found to exhibit a significantly diminishing marginal effect on no-show rates. Further analyses suggested that for appointments rescheduled by the clinic, subsequent rescheduling by patients was associated with a reduced risk of no-shows. Conclusions: No-shows were more common in patients who missed more historical appointments or had their appointments rescheduled more frequently. Encouraging patients to reschedule their own appointments could be an effective measure to reduce no-shows. However, the benefit of patient-rescheduling decreased if patients rescheduled appointments repeatedly.

Keywords

Appointments, No-shows, Patient attendance, Patient adherence, Patient preference, Rescheduling, Outpatient clinics

Discipline

Asian Studies | Business Administration, Management, and Operations | Health and Medical Administration | Organizational Behavior and Theory

Research Areas

Operations Management

Publication

International Journal of Healthcare Management

Volume

17

Issue

4

First Page

651

Last Page

659

ISSN

2047-9700

Identifier

10.1080/20479700.2023.2225760

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Copyright Owner and License

Publisher

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1080/20479700.2023.2225760

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