Effect of mobile phone reminders on the rate of missed appointments among HIV patients on antiretroviral treatment in HIV clinics in Abia State, Nigeria

Abstract

Background: The scourge of HIV/AIDS has left over 36 million people dead since the start of the epidemic. In spite of the scale up in antiretroviral treatment, missed clinic appointments still remains a challenge in the management of HIV-infected individuals. The rapid growth in mobile phone penetration and use of short message service (SMS) has been seen as a potential solution to improve medical and public health practice in Africa

Objective: To determine the effect of mobile phone reminders in reducing missed appointments among HIV patients on antiretroviral treatment (ART).

Materials and Methods: It was a quasi-experimental study with a non-equivalent control group, involving 386 HIV patients on antiretroviral therapy attending two HIV clinics in Abia State, Nigeria, 190 in intervention group and 196 in the control group. A pre-tested interviewer administered questionnaire was used to obtain information from consenting subjects. The intervention group received both text message and phone calls for 6 months while the control group did not. Analysis was done using IBM SPSS version 20.

Results: The mean age was 39.5±8.6 years and 40.7±8.6 years in the intervention and control group's respectively.Comparable proportions were females, had attained a secondary education, were self-employed and owned a mobile phone. Missed appointment rates reduced significantly to 17.9% from 43.7% in the intervention group post-intervention when compared to the control arm. Forgetfulness was the commonest reason for missing appointments in both groups.

Conclusion: This study demonstrates that phone calls and text message reminders significantly reduced the rate of missed appointment in intervention group and that the likely predictor for missed appointment was forgetfulness.

Keywords: HIV, mobile phone reminders, missed appointments, antiretroviral treatment