Social and household factors affecting child health checkup attendance based on a household survey in Japan

Abstract

Child health checkups are an important public service to support children’s development; however, many children do not attend all the child health checkups that are required by maternal and child health law (i.e., at 1 month, 4 months, 1 and a half years, and 3 years of age). This study aimed to identify social and household factors influencing child health checkup attendance. We used data from a longitudinal household panel study in Japan. The total number of subjects was 2,612 children. We extracted numerous social variables reflecting childcare and conducted logistic regression analyses. In every health checkup, the attendance rate was significantly lower for children whose birth order was 3rd or later. Children whose father graduated from a 4-year college or whose mother had 5 or more communicating neighbors were significantly more likely to attend the 1-and-a-half-year checkup. Children whose maternal annual income was in the middle range (1.5 to 5.0 million yen) tended not to attend checkups after 1 and a half years of age. We concluded that the later birth order was the factor of non-attendance. On the other hand, high paternal educational attainment and many communicating neighbors were identified as the factors of attendance.

The Association between Types of COVID-19 Information Source and the Avoidance of Child Health Checkups in Japan: Findings from the JACSIS 2021 Study

“…Third, we could not identify what kinds of articles or magazines were associated with avoiding children’s health checkups. Finally, although we selected the covariates from a previous similar study [ 23 ], unmeasured confounders, such as the availability of childcare services, parents’ working hours, and the number of paid days off work, might have caused a bias in the association.…”

“…The covariates were selected from the previous study that examined factors influencing child health checkups using data from a longitudinal household panel survey in Japan [ 23 ]. The study indicated that maternal age at birth, birth order, parents’ educational attainment, household income, the frequency of help from grandmothers, and the number of communicating neighbors were factors that influenced health checkup attendance.…”

The Effect of Parental Social Integration on the Physical Examination Utilization for Young Migrant Children: A National Cross-Sectional Study in China

“…Localized social interaction could help migrants to be better familiar with the local culture, customers, decrease exclusion of mainstream social settings and have a strong sense of belonging to the inflow areas. On the other hand, migrants could obtain local information from their neighbors, including information on how to use the local health services ( 16 , 27 ). A study had suggested that mothers who were socially integrated can obtain relevant oral health information from their surroundings individuals, which indirectly improves children's oral health service utilization ( 28 ).…”

Missed initial appointments at Israeli child development centres: Rate, reasons, and associated characteristics

“…Various factors have been found related to missed appointments, including: patient characteristics (e.g., age, sex, ethnicity, socioeconomic status); family logistics (e.g., working parents, care of other children); clinic accessibility (e.g., distance, transportation, opening hours); and administrative factors (e.g., cost, waiting period, communication errors). [14][15][16][17] Furthermore, patients who do not perceive the service as urgent or particularly helpful tend to miss their appointment. 17,18 On the other hand, being referred for assessment by a physician has been found to have a significant positive impact on keeping an appointment.…”