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theses

Patient delay has been shown to be an important antecedent of mortality and medical complications. To design interventions to decrease delay it is imperative to understand the complex decisions and actions involved in the multifaceted process of health-care-seeking behavior. We used a simulation, i.e., asking participants how long they would wait to take specific actions if experiencing moderate abdominal pain, as an initial step to examine the sequences of responding and to gain insight into the processes underlying these decisions. Anticipated latency to specific actions, e.g., using a home remedy, communicating with family or friends, and seeking professional care, was investigated. We explored gender and health anxiety relations with anticipated action latencies as well. In addition to examining delay for oneself, we examined the advice the respondents would give to a friend facing an identical scenario. Participants were undergraduates from Rutgers University (n=145) who completed an online questionnaire including abdominal pain health scenarios. Overall, latencies were shorter to take OTC medications or talk to someone about symptoms than to seeking a health care professional and the most common behaviors reported were resting or waiting (31.1%), followed by taking OTC medication (22.7%), seeing a healthcare professional (18.2%), and taking a home remedy (11.4%). Consistent with hypotheses, higher health anxiety scores were associated with shorter anticipated latencies to take OTC medications or home remedies (B=-.07, SE=.032, Wald Χ2 (1)=4.81, p=.028). Additionally men anticipated longer latencies to taking any action than did women (B=.66, SE=.32, Wald X2 (1)=4.08, p=.043), as hypothesized. Comparing self-described action with advice to a friend, showed that respondents were more likely to advise friends to take OTC medications (X2 (1)=3.58, p=.059), but were less likely to advise friends to seek professional care, relative to their self-care plans (X2 (1)=12.42, p=.000). Implications of these findings are discussed.

ETD_7480

M.S.

Includes bibliographical references

by Jenna Herold

doi:10.7282/T36H4KQ3

ETD graduate

The author owns the copyright to this work.