Abstract
Purpose
Exploration of the reasons why people miss scheduled inpatient appointments from the perspectives of patients.
Methods
Semi-structured interviews via telephone were conducted with patients who missed their inpatient appointments. Data were analyzed based on Colaizzi’s seven-step method.
Results
Twenty-five patients and five dependents were enrolled. Three themes were identified: practical barriers, lack of knowledge about the disease, and negative emotional responses. Personal social obligations, state of illness, financial issues and long waiting times were the main practical barriers preventing patients from attending their inpatient appointment. Patients’ perceptions of feasible self-solving symptoms, readily believing people around them, and a blindly optimistic attitude towards disease contributed to their insufficient knowledge about the disease. Negative emotional responses (eg, sense of fear and lack of trust in physicians) had a detrimental effect on inpatient attendance.
Conclusion
Three main factors contributed to non-attendance of inpatient appointments: practical barriers, lack of knowledge about disease, and negative emotional response. Our study provides new, valuable evidence on non-attendance of inpatient appointments in China. Our findings could offer meaningful insights into developing effective strategies to reduce non-attendance of inpatient appointments in other countries.
Acknowledgments
We thank Xiaocong Li for critical review of this manuscript, providing language help, and writing assistance.
Author Contributions
All authors contributed to data analysis, drafting or revising the article, have agreed on the journal to which the article will be submitted, gave final approval of the version to be published, and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.
Disclosure
All authors declared no potential conflicts of interest.