Well-woman Visit

Well-woman Visit in United States

United States

Annual health exams provide an opportunity for women to access preventive services and discuss strategies to minimize health risks and achieve a healthy lifestyle. Based on age and risk, annual assessments should include:

• Screenings for disease.
• Health history review.
• Counseling and health education.

Regular well-woman visits are recommended even if certain aspects of the visit, such as a cervical cancer screening or vaccines, are not performed each year. 

Addressing health risks such as smoking, obesity and alcohol use through preventive services like patient counseling and education has proven a cost-effective way of improving health.

The prevalence of well-woman visits in the past year is higher among: 

• Women ages 35-44 compared with women ages 24-34.
• Black women compared with multiracial, white, American Indian/Alaska Native, Hispanic, Asian and women who identify as other race.
• Women who are college graduates compared with women with less than a high school education and those with a high school diploma or GED degree.
• Women with annual household incomes of $75,000 or more compared with women with incomes less than $75,000 per year.
• Women living in metropolitan areas compared with those living in non-metropolitan areas.
• Women who reported high health status compared with those who reported a low health status. 
• Insured women compared with uninsured women. 

With its passage in 2010, the Affordable Care Act made it mandatory for insurance policies to cover certain women’s preventive health care services at no cost to the woman, including at least one well-woman visit per year.

The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists offers recommendations for screening, evaluating, counseling and immunizations for women of different age groups.

The Women’s Preventive Services Initiative provides guidelines on evidence-based services and recommendations for women’s preventive visits.

Hall, Kelli Stidham, Vanessa Dalton, and Timothy R. B. Johnson. 2014. “Social Disparities in Women’s Health Service Use in the United States: A Population-Based Analysis.” Annals of Epidemiology 24 (2): 135–43. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.annepidem.2013.10.018.

Maciosek, Michael V., Ashley B. Coffield, Thomas J. Flottemesch, Nichol M. Edwards, and Leif I. Solberg. 2010. “Greater Use Of Preventive Services In U.S. Health Care Could Save Lives At Little Or No Cost.” Health Affairs 29 (9): 1656–60. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2008.0701.