A comparison of physician-patient views of teen prenatal information needs

To help physicians provide supportive information to pregnant teens, 146 pregnant adolescents and 46 physicians completed self-administered questionnaires about prenatal and infant care. Teens placed great importance on knowing about prenatal and parenting behaviors. Teens and physicians generally attached similar importance to concerns across all items (p less than 0.45). Both groups considered similar items extremely important, with the exception of birth control, which was more frequently rated extremely important by physicians (p less than 0.001). However, physicians reported differences between the importance they attached and the importance they thought teens would attack to items (p less than 0.001). Physicians did not accurately estimate the importance teens would attribute to 23 of the 24 items (p less than 0.001), and they anticipated that the teens would attach significantly less importance to items than the teens actually attached. Psychosocial concerns, which physicians anticipated would be considered most important, were often minimized by teens. Responses were not significantly associated with physician age, sex, or level of training, thus suggesting the need to address patient information concerns at all levels of professional education.