BACKGROUND Loss to follow-up of trial participants represents a threat to research validity. To date, interventions designed to increase participants' awareness of benefits to society of completing follow-up, and the impact of a telephone call from a senior female clinician and researcher requesting follow-up have not been evaluated robustly. PURPOSE Trial 1 aimed to evaluate the effect on tr...

OBJECTIVE To determine whether there is a significant difference in initial successful contact when attempting follow-up of patients discharged from a pediatric emergency department (ED) using either pagers or the telephone. In addition, to evaluate whether the combination of both pager and telephone follow-up is more successful than telephone follow-up alone when confined to a 2-hour period. ...

BACKGROUND The long-term effect of problem-based learning (PBL) on factual knowledge is poorly investigated. We took advantage of a previous randomised comparison between PBL and traditional teaching in a 3rd year course to follow up factual knowledge of the students during their 4th and 5th year of medical school training. METHODS 3rd year medical students were initially randomized to partic...

BACKGROUND After a contact with a primary care physician (PCP) cooperative for out-of-hours care, many patients have subsequent contact with health care. Little is known about the factors associated with these follow-up contacts. The objective of this study was to examine whether patient experiences with nurse telephone consultations and the cooperative's organizational characteristics were ass...

background: telenursing includes every nursing and care-giving services conducted remotely. in telenursing, telephone as a device, which is available for most of the people, is being used increasingly. in a telephone-based system, patients are being contacted by health care providers on regular bases and they would be provided with some information about their illness and their treatment method...

BACKGROUND Prevalence estimates may be biased if the characteristics of respondents differ from those of non-respondents in surveys. In this study, we used a follow-up telephone interview of initial non-respondents to examine the differences--in terms of self-rated health and health behaviours--to initial postal respondents and to assess improvements in prevalence estimates. METHODS Following...

BACKGROUND Telephone follow-up interviewing is one method of monitoring treatment outcomes of individuals involved in drug and alcohol treatment programs. The present study is the first to examine the feasibility and generalizability of data obtained from telephone follow-up interviews after drug and alcohol treatment in Australia. METHODS Participants attended 1 of 8 Salvation Army Recovery ...

BACKGROUND A key challenge for longitudinal cohort studies is follow-up and retention of study participants. Participant follow-up in longitudinal cohort studies is costly and time-consuming for research staff and participants. OBJECTIVE This study determined the feasibility and costs of using Web-based technologies for follow-up and collection of patient-reported outcomes in the Mediators of...

PURPOSE To evaluate reasons for non-compliance with post-cataract surgical follow-up in rural China, and assess the impact of incentives on improving compliance. METHODS Patients having undergone cataract surgery more than 3 months previously at cataract surgery training hospitals in Guangdong were invited by telephone and advertisements to a hospital-based study examination, with compensatio...