NCT06581250

Improving Show Rates in Dental Care Settings Serving Underserved Populations

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

• Status: Active Not Recruiting
• Phase: N/A
• Study type: Interventional
• Enrollment: 48 (estimated)
• Sponsor: University of Wisconsin, Madison · Academic / Other
• Sex: All
• Age: 18 Years
• Healthy volunteers: Accepted

Summary

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

Detailed 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.

Conditions

• Dental Care

Interventions

Type	Name	Description
BEHAVIORAL	Reminder Messages	Dental clinic staff will use scripts to contact patients 24 and 48 hours before appointments. These scripts will guide staff in confirming the patient will appear for their appointment.
BEHAVIORAL	Walk-in Visits	When contacting patients to schedule an appointment (by phone, email, text, or other methods), dental clinic staff will notify patients of times during which patients can walk-in for a dental visit, if convenient for them; otherwise, a regular appointment will be arranged. Scheduled appointments will continue to be available in addition to the walk-in hours.
BEHAVIORAL	Motivation-enhanced Communication	Participating clinic site staff will be trained in motivation-enhanced communication techniques using the guide for dental clinic sites and coaching. Topics to be included in the motivation-enhanced communication training are a) to determine what patients hope to gain from their dental care, steps needed to succeed, how the agency and client will work together to attain the goals, and b) to identify patient barriers to attending their visit (e.g., transportation, payment, do not understand need for visit, etc.), and what the agency and patient will do to overcome those barriers. Staff will be instructed to use these techniques with patients at every contact about an upcoming appointment.

Timeline

• Start date: 2025-04-04
• Primary completion: 2029-01-31
• Completion: 2029-01-31
• First posted: 2024-09-03
• Last updated: 2026-04-15

Locations

1 site across 1 country: United States