The DOI matches its Crossref record; 20 of the 20 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Text messaging reminders to reduce non-attendance in chronic disease follow-up: a clinical trial
Open accessAbstract
BACKGROUND: Non-attendance results in administrative problems and disruption in patient care. Several interventions have been used to reduce non-attendance, with varying degree of success. A relatively new intervention, text messaging, has been shown to be as effective as telephone reminders in reducing non-attendance. However, no study has looked specifically at using text messaging reminders to reduce non-attendance in chronic disease care. AIM: To determine if text messaging would be effective in reducing non-attendance in patients on long-term followup, compared with telephone reminders and no reminder. DESIGN OF STUDY: A randomised controlled trial with three arms: text messaging reminder, telephone reminder, and control. SETTING: Two primary care clinics in Malaysia. METHOD: A total of 931 subjects who had been on at least 6 months of follow-up were randomised into the three groups. Demographic variables were recorded at the first visit. In the intervention arms, a reminder was sent 24–48 hours prior to the appointment. Non-attendance rate was documented at the second visit. Non-attenders were defined as those who did not attend, attended early, or attended late without rescheduling their appointment. Attenders were defined as participants who had turned up for their scheduled appointment and those who had changed or cancelled their appointment with notification. RESULTS: The non-attendance rates in the text messaging group (odds ratio [OR] = 0.62, 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.41 to 0.93, P = 0.020) and the telephone reminder group (OR = 0.53, 95% CI = 0.35 to 0.81), P = 0.003) were significantly lower than the control group. The absolute non-attendance rate for telephone reminders was lower by 2% compared to the text messaging group. This difference was not found to be statistically significant (P = 0.505). CONCLUSION: Text messaging was found to be as effective as telephone reminder in reducing non-attendance in patients who required long-term follow-up for their chronic illnesses in this study. It could be used as an alternative to conventional reminder systems.
Overview
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
The claims and statistics of this paper haven’t been checked yet.
Run the check — free, no account needed. It reads the open-access text and checks the sources it cites.
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
The cited source doesn’t support the claim as written.
In the citing paper
“The nonattendance rates for the three groups were 13.7% for the text messaging group, 15.6% for the telephone group, and 23.0% for the control group.”
From The Empirical Foundations of Telemedicine Interventions in Primary Care (2016) · cites this paper as [95]
Checked by a reasoning model — may be wrong.
Experimental — accuracy not yet measuredThe cited source says what the claim attributes to it.
In the citing paper
“When the control group was used as reference, the odds ratio for the telephone group was 0.53, and that for text messaging was 0.62.”
From The Empirical Foundations of Telemedicine Interventions in Primary Care (2016) · cites this paper as [95]
The cited source says what the claim attributes to it.
In the citing paper
“Differences between telephone and text messages were not statistically different, and both types reduced nonattendance more than the control group.”
From The Empirical Foundations of Telemedicine Interventions in Primary Care (2016) · cites this paper as [95]
In the citing paper
“two studies included in our review show that they are also effective at increasing attendance rates of patients with NCDs [26, 30].”
From A systematic review of randomized controlled trials of mHealth interventions against non-communicable diseases in developing countries (2016) · cites this paper as [30]
In the citing paper
“The most basic intervention in the category of remote monitoring & care support was an appointment-reminder system, where text messages were sent 24–48 h before the patients’ scheduled appointments [30].”
From A systematic review of randomized controlled trials of mHealth interventions against non-communicable diseases in developing countries (2016) · cites this paper as [30]
In the citing paper
“Liew et al. [30] found that text messages and telephone appointment reminders lowered non-attendance of patients significantly when compared to controls.”
From A systematic review of randomized controlled trials of mHealth interventions against non-communicable diseases in developing countries (2016) · cites this paper as [30]
Self-check
Percentages, sums and reported differences re-computed from the paper’s own numbers.
The self-check needs the paper’s full text.
Citations
Cites
Consumer attitude and the usage and adoption of home‐based banking in the United Kingdom
Howcroft, B., Hamilton, R., & Hewer, P. (2002) · International Journal of Bank Marketing · doi:10.1108/02652320210424205 · Cited by 546
An Overview of Interventions to Improve Compliance With Appointment Keeping for Medical Services
Macharia, W. (1992) · JAMA · doi:10.1001/jama.1992.03480130129038 · Cited by 369
The use of text messaging to improve attendance in primary care: a randomized controlled trial
Leong, K. C., Chen, W. S., Leong, K. W., Mastura, I., Mimi, O., Sheikh, M. A., Zailinawati, A. H., Ng, C. J., Phua, K. L., & Teng, C. L. (2006) · Family Practice · doi:10.1093/fampra/cml044 · Cited by 291
Self-citationChen, Z.-W., Fang, L.-Z., Chen, L.-Y., & Dai, H.-L. (2008) · Journal of Zhejiang University SCIENCE B · doi:10.1631/jzus.b071464 · Cited by 231
Use of SMS text messaging to improve outpatient attendance
Downer, S. R., Meara, J. G., & Costa, A. C. D. (2005) · The Medical Journal of Australia · doi:10.5694/j.1326-5377.2005.tb07085.x · Cited by 231
Neal, R. D., Hussain‐Gambles, M., Allgar, V. L., Lawlor, D. A., & Dempsey, O. (2005) · BMC Family Practice · doi:10.1186/1471-2296-6-47 · Cited by 200
SMS text messaging improves outpatient attendance
Downer, S. R., Meara, J. G., Costa, A. C. D., & Sethuraman, K. (2006) · Australian Health Review · doi:10.1071/ah060389 · Cited by 189
Text message advertising: Response rates and branding effects
Rettie, R., Grandcolas, U., & Deakins, B. (2005) · Journal of Targeting Measurement and Analysis for Marketing · doi:10.1057/palgrave.jt.5740158 · Cited by 174
Zhou-wen, Chen, Li-zheng, Fang, LiYing, L., Honglei, & Dai (2008) · Journal of Zhejiang University SCIENCE B · Cited by 164
Martin, C., Perfect, T., & Mantle, G. (2005) · Family Practice · doi:10.1093/fampra/cmi076 · Cited by 130
Lost to follow‐up: the problem of defaulters from diabetes clinics
Griffin, S. J. (1998) · Diabetic Medicine · doi:10.1002/(sici)1096-9136(1998110)15:3+ · Cited by 122
Telephone reminders improve adolescent clinic attendance: A randomized controlled trial
Sawyer, S. M., Zalan, A., & Bond, L. M. (2002) · Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health · doi:10.1046/j.1440-1754.2002.00766.x · Cited by 115
Texting decreases the time to treatment for genital Chlamydia trachomatis infection
Menon-Johansson, A. S. (2006) · Sexually Transmitted Infections · doi:10.1136/sti.2004.014381 · Cited by 109
Texting appointment reminders to repeated non-attenders in primary care: randomised controlled study
Fairhurst, K., & Sheikh, A. (2008) · Quality and Safety in Health Care · doi:10.1136/qshc.2006.020768 · Cited by 94
van Baar, J. D. (2006) · BMJ Quality & Safety · doi:10.1136/qshc.2004.013342 · Cited by 61
Why Do Patients With Chronic Illnesses Fail To Keep Their Appointments? A Telephone Interview
Ah, Z., Ng, C. J., & Hanafi, N. S. (2006) · Asia Pacific Journal of Public Health · doi:10.1177/10105395060180010301 · Cited by 59
Self-citationWaning Effectiveness of Mailed Reminders on Reducing Broken Appointments
Morse, D. L., Coulter, M. P., Nazarian, L. F., & Napodano, R. J. (1981) · PEDIATRICS · doi:10.1542/peds.68.6.846 · Cited by 34
Missed GP appointments cost NHS money
Beecham, L. (1999) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj.319.7209.536c · Cited by 22
Overuse of animal antibiotics threatens human health
Woodman, R. J. (1999) · BMJ · doi:10.1136/bmj.319.7209.536 · Cited by 4
Assessing Feasibility of Text Messaging to Improve Medication Adherence
Castaño, P. M., Andres, R., Lara, M., & Westhoff, C. L. (2006) · Obstetrics and Gynecology · doi:10.1097/00006250-200604001-00093 · Cited by 4
Research works printed but not linked: 2
- Patel, 2007, The use of a text messaging service to improve attendance at a sickle cell clinic (poster presentations: red cell disorders), Br J Haematol, 137, 31
- Malik, 2007, Towards a better outpatient service in inflammatory bowel disease, Gut, 56, A17
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Free, C., Phillips, G., Watson, L., Galli, L., Felix, L., Edwards, P., Patel, V., & Haines, A. (2013) · PLoS Medicine · doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.1001363 · Cited by 1,187
Healthcare in the pocket: Mapping the space of mobile-phone health interventions
Klasnja, P., & Pratt, W. (2012) · Journal of Biomedical Informatics · doi:10.1016/j.jbi.2011.08.017 · Cited by 970
Mobile phone messaging reminders for attendance at healthcare appointments
Gurol‐Urganci, I., de Jongh, T. E., Vodopivec‐Jamšek, V., Atun, R. A., & Car, J. (2013) · Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews · doi:10.1002/14651858.cd007458.pub3 · Cited by 623
‘Mobile’ Health Needs And Opportunities In Developing Countries
Kahn, J. G., Yang, J. S., & Kahn, J. S. (2010) · Health Affairs · doi:10.1377/hlthaff.2009.0965 · Cited by 408
Beratarrechea, A., Lee, A. G., Willner, J. M., Jahangir, E., Ciapponi, A., & Rubinstein, A. (2014) · Telemedicine and e-Health · doi:10.1089/tmj.2012.0328 · Cited by 403
Metadata
- Authors
- Liew, S.-M., Tong, S. F., Mun Lee, V. K., Ng, C. J., Leong, K. C., & Teng, C. L.
- Affiliations
- National University of Singapore (SG)
- University of Malaya (MY)
- Deakin University (AU)
- IMU University (MY)
- Venue
- British Journal of General Practice
- Published
- 2009-12-01
- Volume
- 59
- Issue
- 569
- Pages
- 916-920
- ISSN
- 0960-1643 (ISSN-L)
- 1478-5242
- PMC
- PMC2784529
- OpenAlex
- W2021342127
- Cited by
- 134
- References
- 20
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 5 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 10 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 10 · 2016: 12 · 2015: 14 · 2014: 14 · 2013: 11 · 2012: 15
- FWCI
- 11.29
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- British Journal of General Practice (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- The University of Malaya Research Repository (University of Malaya) (submittedVersion)
- Own your potential (DEAKIN) (submittedVersion)
- Figshare (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- Funders
- Universiti Malaya
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Decision Sciences › Management Science and Operations Research › Healthcare Operations and Scheduling Optimization
- Health Sciences › Health Professions › General Health Professions › Mobile Health and mHealth Applications
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Family Practice › Medication Adherence and Compliance
- Keywords
- appointment non-attendance, SMS reminders, telephone reminders, chronic disease follow-up, primary care, appointment scheduling, reminder systems, patient attendance
- MeSH terms
- Chronic Disease, Female, Follow-Up Studies, Humans, Male, Middle Aged, Patient Compliance, Primary Health Care, Reminder Systems, Cell Phone
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
