Barriers to participation in a telemedicine-based, family-based behavioral group treatment program for pediatric obesity: qualitative findings from rural caregivers

ABSTRACT

This study examined factors influencing rural caregivers’ decision to decline participation in a healthy lifestyle intervention. Eligible caregivers of rural children who declined participation in a healthy lifestyle intervention were interviewed regarding reasons for declining. Inductive thematic analyses were conducted for responses. Caregiver interviews (n = 16) resulted in 5 saturated themes: (1) rural families’ household schedules prohibit participation, (2) preference for diverse treatment approaches, (3) desire for information across multimedia platforms, and more communication with a point-of-contact, (4) support for an inclusive approach integrated with existing school practices, and (5) caregivers had an understanding of behaviors that promote health.

Acknowledgments

We wish to acknowledge the immense contributions of the participants in this project, as well as the medical students and other trainees who contributed to this work. Finally, we wish to acknowledge our funding from the National Institutes of Health (R01 NR016255 to A Davis).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

Data are available by contacting the corresponding author.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Institute of Nursing Research of the National Institutes of Health under award number R01NR016255 to A Davis.