Related Experiment Video
Updated: Jun 23, 2026

E-Patient Counseling Trial (E-PACO): Computer Based Education versus Nurse Counseling for Patients to Prepare for Colonoscopy
Published on: August 1, 2019
Why patients miss follow-up appointments: a prospective control-matched study
1Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Tygerberg Hospital/University of Stellenbosch Faculty of Health Sciences, Cape Town, South Africa. graeme@prometics.com
Objectives:
To investigate missed appointments in a South African tertiary hospital.
Study Design:
Prospective, descriptive series with controls.
Setting:
The ENT/Oncology clinic at Tygerberg Academic Hospital, South Africa.
Subject:
305 patients with a head and neck malignancy who had follow-up appointments over 4 consecutive months between June and September 2006. A control group of 31 patients who attended the clinic was recruited in September 2006.
Method:
Analysis of the clinic attendance statistics to identify patients who missed follow-up appointments followed by a file review and interview of these patients. The results were compared with a control group.
Outcome Measures:
1) Incidence rate of failure to attend follow-up. 2) Causative factors.
Results:
51 (17%) booked patients missed their appointments. Non-attenders were most likely to miss their follow-up between 6 and 12 months (17/31) after treatment. No correlations were found between diagnosis, disease stage and missed appointments. Reasons include: transport (19 responses), ill-health (6) and financial constraints (5). State transport was unavailable to almost two-thirds of the responders who cited transport as a problem.
Conclusions:
The 17% missed appointment rate is largely due to transport constraints. The commonest time for patients to miss appointments is the 6-12 month follow-up period. The authors seek to identify patients at risk of missed appointments and suggest interventions to decrease this incidence.
Related Concept Videos
Assumptions of Survival Analysis
Bioavailability Study Design: Healthy Subjects Versus Patients
Blind Procedures
Kaplan-Meier Approach
Observational Studies
There are three types of observational studies – Prospective, retrospective, and cross-sectional.
Prospective Study
Prospective studies, also known as longitudinal or cohort studies, are carried out by collecting future data from groups sharing similar characteristics. One example of...
Methods of Documentation VI: Case Management Model
For example, a patient with a chronic illness...