Trial reportCMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne2013
The effect of socioeconomic status on access to primary care: an audit study.
Trial report in CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne, 2013. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 70 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
70 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- A systematic review of causal pathways of socioeconomic inequalities in stroke.International journal of stroke : official journal of the International Stroke Society · 2026Pooled it
- Examining Access to Primary Care for People With Opioid Use Disorder in Ontario, Canada: A Randomized Clinical Trial.JAMA network open · 2022Trial
- Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus in Class II and III Obesity: Prevalence, Associated Factors, and Correlation between Glycemic Parameters and Body Mass Index.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2020Trial
- Social Status and Clinical Resource Allocation by a Large Language Model: An Evaluation of 30,618 Decisions.Journal of personalized medicine · 2026Article
- Inequitable Access to Catheter Ablation for Atrial Fibrillation and Adverse Outcomes in a Publicly Funded Healthcare System.CJC open · 2026Article
- Article
- Quality of Life Impact of Velopharyngeal Insufficiency: The Role of Social Determinants of Health.The Laryngoscope · 2026Article
- Mismatch between registration possibilities and patients' local health needs, a simulated patient survey in the Paris metropolitan area.Human resources for health · 2025Article
- Testing regular expression searches and machine learning models to determine housing instability and low income status from primary care electronic medical record data in Toronto, Ontario.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Association Between Prenatal Cannabis Exposure and Child Health Care Use: A Retrospective Cohort Study in Ontario, Canada.Journal of pediatrics. Clinical practice · 2025Article
- Patient characteristics and degrees of discontinuity of care in Danish general practice: a cohort study.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2025Article
- Exploring Socio-Demographic Characteristics of Caregivers Who Indicated a Child Was Substantially Affected by Others' Drinking in Australia.Drug and alcohol review · 2025Article
- Disparity in access to orthopedic surgery between public and private healthcare insurance: a nationwide population-based study.BMC musculoskeletal disorders · 2025Article
- Identification of Psychosocial and Sociodemographic Factors Associated with Low Medication Awareness in COPD Subjects: A Cross-Sectional Study, Findings from the Indonesian Family Life Survey 5.International journal of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease · 2025Article
- Racial and socioeconomic disparities in survival among patients with metastatic non-small cell lung cancer.Journal of the National Cancer Institute · 2024Article
- "Just clearly the right thing to do": perspectives of correctional services leaders on moving governance of health-care in custody.International journal of prison health · 2024Article
- The association of socioeconomic status on kidney transplant access and outcomes: a nationwide cohort study in Taiwan.Journal of nephrology · 2024Article
- Analyzing the association between social vulnerability indexes and surgically underserved areas in the Inland Empire.Surgery open science · 2024Article
- Homelessness is a health crisis: why hospitals are resorting to building housing.CMAJ : Canadian Medical Association journal = journal de l'Association medicale canadienne · 2024Article
- The association between household food insecurity and healthcare costs among Canadian children.Canadian journal of public health = Revue canadienne de sante publique · 2024Article
10 more citing papers are in PubMed but not listed here.
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundHealth care office staff and providers may discriminate against people of low socioeconomic status, even in the absence of economic incentives to do so. We sought to determine whether socioeconomic status affects the response a patient receives when seeking a primary care appointment.
methodsIn a single unannounced telephone call to a random sample of family physicians and general practices (n = 375) in Toronto, Ontario, a male and a female researcher each played the role of a patient seeking a primary care physician. Callers followed a script suggesting either high (i.e., bank employee transferred to the city) or low (i.e., recipient of social assistance) socioeconomic status, and either the presence or absence of chronic health conditions (diabetes and low back pain). We randomized the characteristics of the caller for each office. Our primary outcome was whether the caller was offered an appointment.
resultsThe proportion of calls resulting in an appointment being offered was significantly higher when the callers presented themselves as having high socioeconomic status than when they presented as having low socioeconomic status (22.6% v.14.3%, p = 0.04) and when the callers stated the presence of chronic health conditions than when they did not (23.5% v. 12.8%, p = 0.008). In a model adjusted for all independent variables significant at a p value of 0.10 or less (presence of chronic health conditions, time since graduation from medical school and membership in the College of Family Physicians of Canada), high socioeconomic status was associated with an odds ratio of 1.78 (95% confidence interval 1.02-3.08) for the offer of an appointment. Socioeconomic status and chronic health conditions had independent effects on the likelihood of obtaining an appointment.
interpretationWithin a universal health insurance system in which physician reimbursement is unaffected by patients' socioeconomic status, people presenting themselves as having high socioeconomic status received preferential access to primary care over those presenting themselves as having low socioeconomic status.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.