The Effectiveness of Waiting Room Notice-Boards as a Vehicle for Health Education

To determine whether patients read and remembered health promotionmessages displayed in waiting rooms, 600 patients in a UK generalpractice were given a self-complete questionnaire. Two notice-boardscarried between 1 to 4 topics over four study periods. Three-hundredand twenty-seven (55%) of subjects responded. Twenty-two percent recalled at least one topic. Increasing the number of topicsdid not in crease the overall impact of the notice-boards. Thenumbers of patients recalling a topic remained constant, butincreasing the number of topics reduced the number rememberingeach individual topic. Patients aged over 60 years were lesslikely to recall topics, but waiting time, gender and healthprofessional seen had no effect on results. Very few patients(<10%) read or took health promotion leaflets. These resultssuggest that the role of waiting room notice-boards should bereassessed. More modern methods of communication such as electronicnotice-boards or videos could be used. However, the waitingroom might best function not as an area where a captive audiencecan be bombarded with health promotion messages, but ratheras a place for relaxation before consulting a health professional,making patients more receptive to health advice in the consultation.