Improving Show Rates in Dental Care Settings Serving Underserved Populations

No-Show Prevention Practices in Dental Care Settings Serving Underserved Populations

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

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.

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