Presentations

Abstract

Introduction: The Health Outreach Partnership of Students (HOPES), student run clinic provides free healthcare services to the underserved populations in the Hampton Roads region. Many of the patients at HOPES clinic do not have reliable access to healthcare nor do they have insurance, making their HOPES appointments even more important in their preventative healthcare. Studies have shown that a lack of preventative care, due to various reasons, leads to an increase in poor prognosis and emergency room admissions. Understanding the reasons behind missed appointments aids clinics in better serving their patient population. Therefore, this study aims to identify these barriers in the HOPES population to gain insight that can be used to decrease missed appointments at this clinic and across other free clinics.

Methods: Aim: To identify barriers that may cause appointment cancellations or no-shows at the HOPES clinic. Design: Retrospective, mixed-methods, study in which patients who have missed an appointment at the HOPES clinic will be identified via Practice Fusion (the clinics patient record site). After identification, investigators will then contact the patients via phone call. Should the patients consent, the investigators will then ask a series of questions with the aim to identify reasons for missed or cancelled appointments. Inclusion criteria & sampling: All HOPES adult patients between 18 and 79 years old who have previously missed an appointment within the last two years (2021-2023). Data Collection/Convergent Analysis: The retrospective, mixed methods study includes quantitative data elements.

Results: Data collection is currently in process. Preliminary data from patient surveys will be available at the time of the presentation.

Conclusion: This mixed methods research project utilizes input from the HOPES clinic and EVMS. While the data has not been fully analyzed, we hypothesize that there will be common socioeconomic factors that impact appointment attendance to primary care appointments. Dissemination: Our data analysis will point to informed interventions to improve appointment attendance at the free clinics across the United States.