Why patients dont engage with physiotherapy?
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A grounded theory approach: Exploring why patients with low back pain choose not to engage with Physiotherapy following assessment using semi structured interviews.
IRAS ID
195276
Contact name
Natalie Hinchliffe
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University Of Bradford
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 9 months, 17 days
Research summary
Why don't low back pain patients engage with physiotherapy following an assessment?
Within musculoskeletal (MSK) physiotherapy at the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS foundation trust (CHT), 30% of all patients attend only for an assessment. At the end of the physiotherapy assessment, patients are given an appointment card with their physiotherapist details on and instructions for how to arrange further appointments – to ring a central booking office. Approximately 30% of this patient group are expected to re attend for treatment, but choose not to book any further appointments, and consequently are not treated.
It is important to explore the reasons why patients choose not to engage, to improve service delivery and reduce potential re-referral rates, which may consequently reduce waiting times. It has been suggested in prior research that patient expectation and satisfaction levels can be linked to such non-attendance, this study aims to explore such factors.
Nationally the number of people suffering with low back pain is increasing, and this is the most common condition seen in MSK physiotherapy (Soroceanu et al 2012). This is reflected in the physiotherapy department at CHT with low back pain accounting for 43% of all assessments. For this reason patients with low back pain are the population of interest in this study.
Semi structured telephone interviews will be used to explore patient expectations, satisfaction levels and reasons for not choosing to return to physiotherapy following an assessment. A purposive sample will be used, with all patients assessed for low back pain who choose not to book further appointments being invited to participate in the study, with consideration to inclusion/exclusion criteria. Participants will be invited into the study via a patient information letter that will be posted to their home address. A phone call will then assess a patients’ decision to participate, and if accepted, a 20 minute interview will be conducted. The interview will be audiotaped to allow for transcription and data analysis.REC name
East of Scotland Research Ethics Service REC 2
REC reference
16/ES/0029
Date of REC Opinion
29 Feb 2016
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion