Improving Show Rates in Dental Care Settings Serving Underserved Populations

University of Wisconsin (UW)

Status: Enrolling

Conditions: Dental Care

Treatments: Behavioral: Motivation-enhanced Communication; Behavioral: Walk-in Visits; Behavioral: Reminder Messages

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other; NIH

Identifiers

NCT06581250

4UH3DE030531-03 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

2024-1502

A195010 (Other Identifier)

2024-1086

Details and patient eligibility

About

The goal of this study is to compare different no-show interventions in dental clinics serving underserved populations. The main question it seeks to answer is

• How do different no-show intervention methods compare in reducing no-shows?

Participants will be asked to

• Implement different interventions
• Report a limited set of data to researchers

Full description

Persistent no-show rates contribute to the oral health disparities and inadequate access to dental care that disproportionately affect underserved populations. The proposed research will test the impact of three different strategies on improving show rates using a full factorial design. Specifically, the study is designed as a 2×2×2 factorial cluster-randomized trial of reminder messaging, motivation-enhanced communication, and walk-in visit. The unit of intervention and randomization will be dental clinic sites (clusters). Forty clinics will be randomized between eight possible combinations of receiving or not receiving the three study interventions, with five clinics receiving each intervention. Findings from this study seek to provide an evidence-based approach to reducing no-shows and increasing access to dental care for underserved populations.

Enrollment: 40 estimated patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

Sites must be:

• Serve at least a 51 percent self-pay and Medicaid patients
• Be willing to provide limited data sets of clinic data to the research team
• Be willing to undertake and support and organizational improvement project to improve show rates

Staff must be:

• A paid staff member at a participating clinic
• Be able and willing to provide written or verbal consent

Exclusion criteria

• No exclusion criteria for clinics or staff

Trial design

Primary purpose: Other

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Factorial Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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40 participants in 8 patient groups

Control

No Intervention group

Reminder Messages

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Reminder Messages

Walk-in Visits

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Walk-in Visits

Motivation-enhanced Communication

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Motivation-enhanced Communication

Reminder Messages & Walk-in visits

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Reminder Messages

Behavioral: Walk-in Visits

Reminder Messages & Motivation-enhanced Communication

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Reminder Messages

Behavioral: Motivation-enhanced Communication

Walk-in visits & Motivation-enhanced Communication

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Walk-in Visits

Behavioral: Motivation-enhanced Communication

Reminder Messages, Walk-in visits, & Motivation-enhanced Communication

Active Comparator group

Treatment:

Behavioral: Reminder Messages

Behavioral: Walk-in Visits

Behavioral: Motivation-enhanced Communication