{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,19]],"date-time":"2026-08-19T06:27:42Z","timestamp":1787120862288,"version":"build-2736575974"},"reference-count":49,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,19]],"date-time":"2026-08-19T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1787097600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Public Health"],"abstract":"<jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Background<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Abnormal laboratory results in routine health examination reports can initiate prevention, confirmation, monitoring, or further consultation. Disclosure alone, however, does not make a result actionable: recipients must construct meaning, calibrate risk, and identify a feasible next step. This study examined non-emergent abnormal results as public health communication events in a regional hospital-affiliated health examination setting in China.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Methods<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>A short-term longitudinal qualitative study was conducted with 48 adults who had received at least one non-emergent abnormal laboratory result at two health examination centers. Baseline interviews used participants' own de-identified reports and result vignettes as elicitation materials. A purposively selected subsample of 28 participants completed follow-up interviews 28\u201343 days later. Reflexive thematic analysis was the primary analytic methodology, supported by framework matrices for cross-case, site-level, and longitudinal comparison.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Five themes explained the result-to-action pathway: abnormality was noticed before it was understood; meaning was negotiated through biography, family, and social consequences; risk was alternately normalized and amplified; follow-up required navigation work; and participants described communication as more actionable when it was respectful, proportionate, time-bound, and linked to a service route. Follow-up trajectories included clinician-linked follow-up, planned monitoring, family or online advice without formal care by follow-up, self-directed repeat testing, and delay or no action. Clinician input or repeat results could feed back to reinterpret the original finding.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>\n                  <jats:sec>\n                    <jats:title>Conclusion<\/jats:title>\n                    <jats:p>Participants did not simply lack information; they encountered a health literacy environment that often transferred interpretive and navigation work to recipients and families. Health examination systems may support more proportionate and navigable follow-up by combining priority labels, plain-language meaning and uncertainty, time-bound next steps, trusted support, and recipient-controlled sharing. These communication components require clinical, usability, and implementation validation and should not be interpreted as clinical guidelines.<\/jats:p>\n                  <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.3389\/fpubh.2026.1900806","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,19]],"date-time":"2026-08-19T05:46:51Z","timestamp":1787118411000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":0,"title":["Making non-emergent abnormal results actionable: a short-term longitudinal qualitative study in two hospital-affiliated health examination centers in China"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"14","author":[{"given":"Long","family":"Yao","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"The First Affiliated Hospital of Shaoyang University","place":["Shaoyang, Hunan, China"]}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Zhuojun","family":"Deng","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"The Second Affiliated Hospital 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