In 1997, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) Committee on Child Health Finance set forth 22 services that individuals up to age 21 should be able to access for "optimal health and well-being". The recommended services include medical care such as "health supervision with preventive care and immunizations according to the AAP's 'Recommendations for Preventive Pediatric Health Care"' [
1]. Routine visits to a pediatrician provide the opportunity for preventive care through well child examinations and family centered care. The AAP recommends 28 well child visits between birth and 21 years of age. Beginning at age 3, one yearly routine preventive care visit is recommended [
1,
2].
The Andersen's Socio-Behavioral Model is a widely used model in research on use of health care services [
3-
7]. Its initial model was developed in the 1960s [
8], and through time it has been expanded and modified. Modern study of health care use and access has shifted from an individual level focus to a combination of the individual, the health care system, the external environment, and the effects that each have on the others. The Andersen model [
8] applied in this study examined 3 determinants of health care use in children: predisposing factors, enabling factors, and perceived needs.
Predisposing factors include biological factors that may influence the likelihood an individual needs a health service, social structure that may influence how an individual can cope with health problems, and health beliefs that may influence an individual's perception of their need for a health service [
8]. Predisposing factors include demographic characteristics and socio-structural characteristics such as education level, race and ethnicity, and family size. Previous research has demonstrated mixed results about the effect of race and ethnicity and family size on the use of pediatric preventive services [
6,
9-
12]. A higher maternal education level, however, is associated with an approximate two times increase in the likelihood of having received a routine visit in the past year for children [
6].
Enabling factors, or resources, include family characteristics such as income, insurance coverage, access to services (transportation and distance to care), and community characteristics such as availability of resources and region of the country. Low family income, being uninsured, and having a regular clinician have been identified as risk factors for inadequate access to preventive health care [
10,
12]. Primary language (English versus non-English) and geographical region of the country have also been found to be associated with access to care [
13]. For example, Spanish speaking Hispanics report decreased odds of having a physician visit, a mental health visit, a mammogram, and an influenza vaccination in the last year after controlling for predisposing, enabling, and need factors as compared to English speaking Hispanics [
14]. For geographical region, living in the West is associated with not being satisfied with child health care [
1].
Perceived needs refer to the revised Andersen model and account for the subjects' health beliefs or psychosocial factors [
15] when measuring access to health care services. Perceived needs may include aspects of the subject's attitudes, values, and knowledge about health problems and services that affect their perception of whether they do or do not need health services. Hughes and Wingard found that parental beliefs, specifically about the timing of routine visits, were associated with having received preventive care in the past year [
6]. Parents of children were asked how often they felt their child should see a doctor or health care professional. If the parent's answer matched the AAP's guidelines, the child was 2.8 times more likely to have had a routine visit in the last year as compared to children of parents whose response did not match the AAP's guidelines [
6].
One critique of the Andersen model is a lack of definition of access in the original model [
16]. According to Andersen, four types of access are defined using multidimensional terms through different aspects of later versions of the behavioral model as used in the current analysis. Potential access refers to the existence of resources which is measured by enabling factors. Andersen suggested that more enabling resources equates to a greater use of health services. Realized access is defined as the use of health services. Equitable access depends on demographic characteristics and need factors, while social structure and health beliefs as described in predisposing factors and enabling resources are responsible for inequitable access [
8].
Most of the studies regarding the use of preventive health care for children have focused on insurance, income, education, and differences among racial/ethnic groups. Andersen's work suggests that other predisposing, enabling, and need factors exist and also play a role in influencing access to health care. In this study, the main goal was to examine which of these predisposing, enabling, and need factors affect access to preventive health care for children.