Evaluation of the use of health care services for non-communicable disease and prevention by children and adolescents in south Italy

Flora Ascione,Gabriella Di Giuseppe,Francesco Napolitano,Diana Cascone

doi:10.1186/s12913-017-2489-4

Flora Ascione, Gabriella Di Giuseppe + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-017-2489-4

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Abstract

BackgroundThe objectives of this investigation are to evaluate the use of health care services for non-communicable disease and prevention by children and adolescents and to identify the factors linked to the use of health care services.MethodsThis cross-sectional survey was conducted between December 2014 and January 2015 among 1198 parents of students aged between 5 and 18 years attending 12 selected schools in the geographic area of Salerno and Naples, Italy, using a self-administered questionnarie.Results68.2% of parents stated that had visited their general practitioner (GP) or family pediatrician (FP) with their child in the last year. 66.2% of children had had at least one visit to a specialist and more than half (54.8%) had had preventive care visits in the last year. The use of preventive care visits within last year was significantly higher amongst female, among those who had visited their GP or FP and among those who had a parent with a college degree or higher. The proportion of emergency department visits and hospital admissions reported were 12.8% and 4.7% respectively.ConclusionThis results highlights the need of educational interventions for parents and adolescents in order to increase the utilization of preventive health services.

Highlights

The objectives of this investigation are to evaluate the use of health care services for noncommunicable disease and prevention by children and adolescents and to identify the factors linked to the use of health care services
Participants’ characteristics In total, 1198 questionnaires were distributed and 891 parents agreed to participate in the survey with a response rate of 74.4%. 231 participants were parents of children selected from the three primary schools and 660 were parents of the students attending the nine secondary schools
Relevants findings were the low value of the preventive visits rates and the higher educational level of parents as one of main determinants of using the preventive health services while no association was observed between the parent’s socio-economic status and preventive care utilization

Summary

Introduction

The objectives of this investigation are to evaluate the use of health care services for noncommunicable disease and prevention by children and adolescents and to identify the factors linked to the use of health care services. Noncommunicable diseases (NCDs) cause millions of deaths each year and are responsible for over two thirds of all deaths worldwide. For this reason the Global action plan for the prevention and control of NCDs 2013–2020 has set the target of reducing by 25% the relative risk of premature mortality from these diseases by 2025 [1]. To improve and preserve the quality of health for children and adolescents, it is essential to have an ordinary and appropriate utilization of the health care services, which provide correct treatment and health promotion. These services include parental health education, routine ceck-ups, immunizations and preventive care visits. The use of the health care services may be affected by many factors including structural and organizational characteristics of services [7,8,9,10,11]; in Italy, in particular, a country

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