General practice cooperatives: long waiting times for home visits due to long distances?

Table 6 Multiple logistic regression-analysis. Relationships of meeting the time targets of the urgency categories U1 and U2 to distance, traffic intensity, home visit intensity, and time of day

	Urgency category: life-threatening (U1)			Urgency category: acute (U2)
	Number of	Percentage of consultations in ≤ 15 min	Odds ratio and 95% confidence interval**	Number of consultations	Percentage of consultations in ≤ 1 hour	Odds ratio and 95% confidence interval**
Total	204	68.8		1613	95.5
Distance in kilometres
0.0–2.4	52	86.5	29.9 (2.8–314.2)*	427	96.2	1.5 (0.4–5.4)
2.5–4.9	61	80.3	17.7 (1.8–178.8)*	440	95.9	1.6 (0.5–5.9)
5.0–7.4	34	70.6	12.0 (1.1–126.4)*	235	93.6	1.1 (0.3–3.9)
7.5–9.9	20	55.0	5.3 (0.5–57.7)	190	94.7	1.0 (0.3–3.8)
10.0–14.9	12	33.3	2.1 (0.2–26.5)	121	95.9	2.3 (0.4–11.9)
15.0–19.9	19	31.6	1.6 (0.1–19.0)	137	96.4	1.4 (0.3–6.0)
≥ 20.0	6	16.7	Reference	63	95.2	Reference
Traffic intensity
Off-peak hours	83	74.7	2.1 (0.6–5.2)	622	96.3	1.2 (0.6–2.4)
Intermediate hours	77	64.9	1.1 (0.7–2.8)	669	95.5	1.4 (0.8–2.6)
Rush hours	45	64.4	Reference	322	94.1	Reference
Home visit intensity
No consultations	55	72.7	1.8 (0.6–5.2)	386	99.0	8.9 (3.0–26.2)*
1 or 2 consultations	107	71.0	1.7 (0.7–4.0)	830	96.6	2.8 (1.7–4.7)*
≥ 3 consultations	42	57.1	Reference	380	90.3	Reference
Time of day
Evening	86	69.0	1.6 (0.7–3.9)	764	95.5	0.6 (0.2–1.4)
Night	69	74.3	1.4 (0.4–4.9)	495	97.4	1.7 (0.7–4.0)
Daytime in the weekend	47	59.6	Reference	353	92.9	Reference

*P < 0.05
**Interpretation: the greater the odds ratio is, the greater the chance that the patient will be seen within the time limit

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