Parental military deployment affects frequency of well-child visits

Parental military deployment triggered a decline in outpatient and well-child visits for young, single parent-families but had the opposite effect on those children with parents who were older or married, study data indicated.

Researchers from the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md., evaluated the ramifications of parental military deployment on rates of accessed health care by matching outpatient claims for children aged younger than 2 years who were enrolled in the military health system to parents’ deployment status during fiscal year 2007. The researchers included 1,772,703 records for outpatient visits of 169,986 children in their analysis. Thirty-two percent had a parent deployed at least once during the study period.

Data indicated that well-child visits accounted for 27% of all visits, according to the researchers, and the unadjusted rates were 10.4 for all visits and 2.8 for well-child visits per year. Results also revealed that outpatient visit rates for children of single parents decreased during deployment, compared with increased numbers among children of married parents.

The researchers also reported comparable outcomes for well-child visits, although they noted that these data were not statistically significant.

Marital status, however, played a smaller role as parental age increased. Parents aged younger than 24 years appeared most affected by deployment. Incidence rate ratios for outpatient visits were 0.82 (95% CI, 0.74-0.91) among single parents in this age group and 1.18 (95% CI, 1.14-1.20) among married parents, according to the researchers. In contrast, the difference between single and married parents was much smaller for parents aged older than 32 years.

“There was a disparity in effects experienced by children of single and married parents, particularly among younger parents, which suggests that the military medical community and military social services should target families with young, single parents,” the researchers wrote. “Further studies also should explore whether similar effects are seen during types of family separation other than military deployment.”

Eide M. Pediatrics. 2010;doi:10.1542/peds.2009-2704.