2020 Volume 35 Issue 1 Pages 66-73
Objective: Our facility delivers recommendation guidance twice to patients needing detailed examinations or treatment decisions. Future issues were clarified through questionnaire results obtained from non-consultation/non-response patients with the aim of increasing the recommendation response rate.
Methods: A questionnaire survey (accepting multiple answers) regarding pre-examination inquiries and post-examination reasons for non-consultation or non-response was conducted on 288 patients who had undergone a complete medical check-up in January 2019, and from whom we had not received a recommendation response during the previous fiscal year. Analyses were conducted based on survey responses according to the stage model of behavioral change.
Results: Of the patients from whom we did not receive recommendation responses, 105 were actually consulted. Survey responses for reasons for non-consultation included “I had forgotten,” “not enough time,” “I was told every year,” and “I didn’t know how to explain to the consulting physician.” Survey responses for reasons for non-response included “I was not aware that a reply was needed,” “too much hassle,” “I had forgotten,” and “I can explain it during the next health check-up.”
Conclusions: The reasons for non-consultation and non-response during each stage were analyzed based on the stage model of behavioral change, and the survey responses were classified into three stages: indifference, awareness, and intent (preparation). We found that it is important to nudge non-consultation patients toward consultation using appropriate content for each stage of behavioral change. Furthermore, since many non-response patients were at the indifference stage, we believe that making patients understand the significance of recommendations and widely disseminating this information will lead to improved implementation ascertainment rates. In the future, we hope to devise simpler response methods, such as by incorporating IT, in order to improve this implementation ascertainment rate.
