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Appointment attendance at a remote rural dental training facility in Australia

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dc.contributor.authorLalloo, R.
dc.contributor.authorMcDonald, J.
dc.date.issued2013
dc.description.abstractBACKGROUND: Non-attended appointments have impacts on the operations of dental clinics. These impacts vary from lost productivity, loss of income and loss of clinical teaching hours. METHODS: Appointment data were analysed to assess the percentage of completed, failed to attend (FTA) and cancelled appointments at an Australian remote rural student dental clinic training facility. The demographic and time characteristics of FTA and cancelled appointments were analysed using simple and multivariate multinomial regression analysis, to inform interventions that may be necessary. RESULTS: Over the 2-year study period a total of 3,042 appointments were made. The percentage of FTA was 21.3% (N = 648) and cancelled appointments 13.7% (N = 418). The odds of an FTA were in excess of 4 times higher in patients aged 19-25 years (OR = 4.1; 95% CI = 2.3-7.3) and 26-35 years (OR = 4.4; 95% CI = 2.5-7.9) compared to patients 65 years and older. The odds of an FTA was 2.3 (95% CI = 1.8-3.1) times higher in public patients compared to private patients. The odds of a cancellation was 1.7 (95% CI = 1.1-2.6) times higher on a Friday compared to a Monday and 1.8 (95% CI = 1.1-2.9) times higher on the last appointment of the day compared to the first appointment. For cancelled appointments, 71.3% were cancelled on the day of the appointment and 16.6% on the day before. CONCLUSIONS: Non-attended appointments (FTA or cancelled) were common at this remote rural dental clinic training facility. Efforts to reduce these need to be implemented; including telephonic reminders, educating the community on the importance of attending their appointments, block booking school children and double booking or arranging alternative activities for the students at times when non-attendance is common.
dc.description.statementofresponsibilityRatilal Lalloo and Jenny M McDonald
dc.identifier.citationBMC Oral Health, 2013; 13(1):36-1-36-8
dc.identifier.doi10.1186/1472-6831-13-36
dc.identifier.issn1472-6831
dc.identifier.issn1472-6831
dc.identifier.orcidLalloo, R. [0000-0001-5822-1269]
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2440/89288
dc.language.isoen
dc.publisherBioMed Central
dc.rights© 2013 Lalloo and McDonald; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
dc.source.urihttps://doi.org/10.1186/1472-6831-13-36
dc.subjectHumans
dc.subjectAge Factors
dc.subjectRural Health Services
dc.subjectRural Population
dc.subjectDental Clinics
dc.subjectTelephone
dc.subjectAdolescent
dc.subjectAdult
dc.subjectAged
dc.subjectChild
dc.subjectMiddle Aged
dc.subjectYoung Adult
dc.subjectTime Factors
dc.subjectPublic Assistance
dc.subjectAppointments and Schedules
dc.subjectEducation, Dental
dc.subjectAustralia
dc.subjectFemale
dc.subjectMale
dc.titleAppointment attendance at a remote rural dental training facility in Australia
dc.typeJournal article
pubs.publication-statusPublished

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