The Impact of Rideshare Transportation Services on Appointment Adherence

Primary Health Care Clinical Trial

Clinical Trial Details — Status: Completed

Administrative data

• NCT number: NCT02955433
• Other study ID #: IRB-824715
• Status: Completed
• Phase: N/A
• Start date: October 2016
• Est. completion date: November 2017

Study information

• Verified date: July 2019
• Source: University of Pennsylvania
• Contact: n/a
• Is FDA regulated: No
• Study type: Interventional

Clinical Trial Summary

This study is a prospective clinical trial designed to primarily test the impact of rideshare-based transportation services from a digital transportation network, Lyft, on reducing primary care clinic missed appointments--a composite outcome of no-shows and same day cancellations--for Medicaid patients. The study population consists of West Philadelphia residents who are established patients at two of the Penn Medicine Primary Care Practices within the University of Pennsylvania Health System. The study subjects are allocated into the intervention or control arm using a pseudorandomization approach - those receiving an appointment reminder on an even calendar day are in the intervention arm and odd calendar day calls are in the control arm.

Secondary outcomes include the time of arrival to the clinics relative to actual appointment time (both arms), prospective utilization of acute care settings (both arms), prospective utilization of primary care (both arms), and description of programmatic metrics in the intervention arm (travel time, misuse, and costs). The investigators will assess the patient experience after each ride using a telephone-based survey and in-depth interviews. All adults with established primary care at the Penn Medicine Clinics, who have Medicaid, and do not require wheelchair accessible rides will be eligible for the rideshare service. The investigators hypothesize that individuals offered a rideshare-based transportation service will have a decreased proportion of missed appointments and same day cancellations as those not offered the service.

Recruitment information / eligibility

• Status: Completed
• Enrollment: 786
• Est. completion date: November 2017
• Est. primary completion date: April 2017
• Accepts healthy volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers
• Gender: All
• Age group: 18 Years and older

Eligibility

Inclusion Criteria:

• Patients insured by Medicaid

• Established primary care patient at the Penn Medicine Clinics

• Address in West Philadelphia zip code

Exclusion Criteria:

• Requiring wheelchair accessible transportation. We are unable to guarantee vehicles that will be able to accommodate these patients' physical needs.

Related Conditions & MeSH terms

• Appointments and Schedules
• Primary Health Care
• Social Determinants of Health
• Transportation

Intervention

Other:
• Rideshare-based transportation

Locations

Country	Name	City	State
United States	Penn Internal Medicine Primary Care Practice	Philadelphia	Pennsylvania

Sponsors (2)

Lead Sponsor	Collaborator
University of Pennsylvania	Lyft, Inc.

Country where clinical trial is conducted

United States, 

References & Publications (2)

Chaiyachati KH, Hubbard RA, Yeager A, Mugo B, Lopez S, Asch E, Shi C, Shea JA, Rosin R, Grande D. Association of Rideshare-Based Transportation Services and Missed Primary Care Appointments: A Clinical Trial. JAMA Intern Med. 2018 Mar 1;178(3):383-389. do — View Citation

Chaiyachati KH, Hubbard RA, Yeager A, Mugo B, Shea JA, Rosin R, Grande D. Rideshare-Based Medical Transportation for Medicaid Patients and Primary Care Show Rates: A Difference-in-Difference Analysis of a Pilot Program. J Gen Intern Med. 2018 Jun;33(6):86 — View Citation

Outcome

Type	Measure	Description	Time frame	Safety issue
Primary	The proportion of missed appointments (no-shows and same-day cancellation) in the intervention arm and the control arm	The missed appointment proportion is based on the one appointment for which patients were contacted to receive a free ride	Within 2 days of enrollment
Secondary	Arrival time to clinic relative to the scheduled time (both arms)		Within 2 days of enrollment
Secondary	Post-intervention, utilization frequency of acute care settings (both arms)		7-days, 30-days, and 6 months post-appointment
Secondary	Post-intervention, utilization frequency of primary care (both arms)		7-days, 30-days, and 6 months post-appointment
Secondary	Post-intervention, frequency of missed primary care appointments (both arms)		30-days and 6-months post-appointment