416 - Parent Perceptions of their Child’s Primary Care Provider’s Attire

A therapeutic alliance with a child’s primary care provider (PCP) is key for best practice family-centered care.  For adult PCPs, perceived knowledge, professionalism, competence, and trustworthiness is associated with type of attire.  It remains unclear whether pediatricians’ attire is perceived in a similar way. 

Objective:

To investigate associations between a child’s PCP’s attire and parents’ perception of their knowledge, trustworthiness, approachability, and desire to stay within that medical home. 

Design/Methods:

In this national cross-sectional online survey study, we recruited parents with at least one child ≤17 years old via Qualtrics in August 2022.  Participants were shown images and descriptions of various provider attire choices (Figure 1) and were asked about their perceptions of provider knowledge, trustworthiness, approachability, and desire to continue care with them, as well as overall preferred attire.  Repeated measure analyses were used for comparison of perceptions of PCPs between clothing types. 

Results:

Among the 2,151 parent participants, the majority (72.7%) identified as female and a majority (60.2%) were ages 30-45. The most common preference (39.7%) was “business casual with a white coat” attire for their child’s PCP (Table 1), and 46.2% of participants reported that how their child’s provider dressed was important to them.  Statistically significant differences were found among the six groups of attire in knowledge, trustworthiness, approachability, and desire to stay with the provider (p< 0.0001) (Table 2). Pair-wise comparisons found that white coat attire was significantly higher rated overall (Table 2). 

Conclusion(s):

Findings suggest that most parents have preferences regarding their child’s PCPs’ attire.  White coats with business casual or scrubs were associated with higher trust and desire to stay with that provider.  Future studies should explore whether staying within a child’s medical home is influenced by the PCP’s attire, and if pediatric patient perceptions correlate with parent perceptions and behavior.  This study also raises ethical questions regarding who determines expectations of professionalism and dress codes in medicine.