The Homeopathic Clinic of the Campo di Marte Hospital, Lucca, Italy (the Homeopathic Reference Centre for Tuscany) registered a total of 1287 patients seen for the first time between September 1998 and 31 December 2004, of these 560 (43.5%) returned for a follow-up visit after a minimum interval of 2 months following the first consultation. In order to ascertain the reasons for patients not returning for follow-up consultations (drop-out) a telephone survey was carried out on every patient who had been seen during the period from 1 June 2002 to 31 May 2003, but had not returned for a follow-up visit. 73/104 eligible patients were contacted. 37/73 referred to the effectiveness of the treatment which led to an improvement in their state of health, naming this as the reason why they did not return for a follow-up visit.