Assessing the representativeness of physician and patient respondents to a primary care survey using administrative data

Table 1 QUALICOPC physician respondents compared with physicians in their practice groups and Ontario primary care physicians

	Group 1: QUALICOPC physician respondents	Group 2: QUALICOPC physicians’ practice groups	Group 3: Ontario primary care physicians	Standardized difference^a
				Group 2 vs. 1	Group 3 vs. 1
	N = 175	N = 2507	N = 9758
Sex, N (%)
Female	98 (56.0)	1177 (47.0)	4110 (42.1)	0.18	0.28
Male	77 (44.0)	1330 (53.0)	5642 (57.8)	0.18	0.28
Age, mean (SD)	49 (10)	51 (11)	51 (12)	0.19	0.20
Years in practice, mean (SD)	23 (11)	25 (12)	25 (13)	0.20	0.21
Canadian medical graduate, N (%)
Yes	141 (80.6)	1878 (74.9)	7054 (72.3)	0.14	0.20
No	34 (19.4)	629 (25.1)	2698 (27.7)	0.14	0.20
Roster size, mean (SD)	1257 (582)	1126 (786)	1120 (1045)	0.19	0.16
Primary care model^b, N(%)
Solo physicians	12 (6.9)	0	3711 (38.0)	-	0.81
FHG	44 (25.1)	1117 (44.6)	2415 (24.8)	0.42	0.01
FHN	< 6	27 (1.1)	202 (2.1)	-	-
FHO	38 (21.7)	401 (16.0)	1765 (18.1)	0.15	0.09
FHT	73 (41.7)	923 (36.8)	1594 (16.3)	0.10	0.58
Other group	< 6	39 (1.6)	71 (0.7)	-	-

SD standard deviation, FHG Family Health Group, FHN Family Health Network, FHO Family Health Organization, FHT Family Health Team
^aClarify that standardized differences >=0.2 are considered a meaningful difference and are highlighted in italics
^bPrimary care models are classified according to type of practice model and remuneration: solo physicians (including enhanced fee for service and fee for service), group enhanced fee for service (i.e. Family Health Group), group capitated (i.e. Family Health Organization), and group capitated with an allied health team (i.e. Family Health Team). Family Health Network and Other group models were not included in the analysis as they each had fewer than 6 physician respondents in the QUALICOPC

ISSN: 2731-4553