Out-of-hours primary care services: Demands and patient referral patterns in a Veneto region (Italy) Local Health Authority

• Published in: Health policy (Amsterdam) Vol. 119; no. 4; pp. 437 - 446
• Main Authors: Buja, Alessandra, Toffanin, Roberto, Rigon, Stefano, Sandonà, Paolo, Carraro, Daniela, Damiani, Gianfranco, Baldo, Vincenzo
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Ireland Elsevier Ireland Ltd 01.04.2015
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; After-Hours Care; Age groups; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Authority; Child; Child, Preschool; Cross-Sectional Studies; Databases, Factual; Delivery of health care; Demographics; Female; Health administration; Health service needs and demands; Health Services Needs and Demand; Humans; Infant; Internal Medicine; Italy; Male; Medical service; Middle Aged; Patients; Physicians; Primary Health Care; Referral and consultation; Referral and Consultation - trends; Retrospective Studies; Specialists; Telephone; Young Adult; Delivery of health care; Primary health care; After-hours care; Health service needs and demands; Referral and consultation
• ISSN: 0168-8510; 1872-6054
• DOI: 10.1016/j.healthpol.2015.01.001

Highlights • Rates of OOH access change in function of contacts socio-demographic characteristics. • This population-based study, focusing found that not only clinical characteristics but also socio-demographic and logistic features of the contact change the propensity of OOH physician to refer patients to ED or to specialist visit. • In addition our study demonstrate that also adjusting for all these variables the OOH physician element involved is associate with the decision to refer a patient to an ED.