Factors Contributing to Miss Appointments among 1-4 Years Old Toddlers for Routine Health Care in Government Health Clinics in Peninsular Malaysia

Abstract

Scheduled routine health care follow up visits among 1-4 years old toddlers to government health clinics are not fully utilized and factors contributing to missed appointments are not well studied. Continuous health care among children under 5 years of age is one of the important factors to reduce morbidity and mortality. Therefore, this study aimed to identify the factors contributing to missed appointments among 1-4 years old toddlers for health care. Unmatched case control study among 570 mothers (285 cases and 285 controls) in five government health clinics in Tumpat district, Kelantan, Malaysia that serving a routine child health care was conducted using guided questionnaire. Analysis involved was binary logistic regression. Results showed that working mothers (adjusted OR:1.59, 95% CI :1.10-2.30, p:<0.05), knowledge of the mothers about child health services in government health clinic (adjusted OR: 8.45, 95% CI: 4.40-16.24, p:<0.001), mother's perception towards health facilities and services in government health clinic (adjusted OR: 1.59, 95% CI: 1.10- 2.30, p:<0.05 and mother's social support from people surrounding (adjusted OR : 4.89, 95% CI: 2.40-9.98, p:<0.001) were the factors contributing to missed appointments. The research findings indicate that special efforts should be made to help working mother, to promote child health care services in government health clinic and to increase social support to mother in child health care in improving their routine health care follow up visits to government health clinic. Keywords Factors, government health clinic, miss appointment, toddler