ArticleFamily practice2020
Out-of-hours primary care in 26 European countries: an overview of organizational models.
Article in Family practice, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 57 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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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.
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Who cites it
57 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 70 citations in OpenAlex.
- Task shifting from general practitioners to other health professionals in out-of-hours primary care - a systematic literature review on content and quality of task shifting.The European journal of general practice · 2024Pooled it
- Factors affecting communication during telephone triage in medical call centres: a mixed methods systematic review.Systematic reviews · 2024Pooled it
- Economic evaluation of diverting low-risk patients from the emergency department to adjacent out-of-hours primary care in Belgium.Primary health care research & development · 2026Trial
- A Symptom-Checker for Adult Patients Visiting an Interdisciplinary Emergency Care Center and the Safety of Patient Self-Triage: Real-Life Prospective Evaluation.Journal of medical Internet research · 2024Trial
- Effect of an educational intervention for telephone triage nurses on out-of-hours attendance: a pragmatic randomized controlled study.BMC health services research · 2023Trial
- Task shifting from general practitioners to nurses and the association with patient flow and resource use in out-of-hours primary care clinics: a descriptive register-based study.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2026Article
- Telehealth and access to acute primary care in Europe: Balancing opportunity and equity.The European journal of general practice · 2026Article
- Telephone triage in urgent unscheduled primary care in 16 European countries: a cross-national questionnaire-based expert study.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2026Article
- Stroke recognition and early care pathways following telephone triage in out-of-hours primary care: a register-based study from the Central Denmark Region.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2026Article
- Out-of-hours services in Zealand, Denmark. Consequences of changeover from GP-cooperative to integrated deputized services. A retrospective cohort study.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2026Article
- Video-supported telephone triage in emergency primary healthcare: an observational study from Norway.BMJ open · 2026Observational
- Impact of a Prototype Combining Recommender Functionality With Structured Documentation on Operator Performance in Calls to Medical Communication Centers: Quasi-Experimental Feasibility Study.JMIR formative research · 2026Article
- Defining delayed and missed diagnosis of acute and chronic coronary syndromes: a modified Delphi consensus method.Open heart · 2026Article
- Observational
- Article
- Using causal effect estimation to evaluate occupational stress factors during a weekend on-call shift among general practitioners in training.BMC primary care · 2025Article
- Diagnostic equipment and point-of-care tests in Norwegian emergency primary healthcare clinics: a cross-sectional study.Scandinavian journal of primary health care · 2025Article
- GP characteristics and video use in out-of-hours primary care: a register-based study.BJGP open · 2025Article
- Impact of video service failure on triage outcomes in Danish out-of-hours primary care: a register-based study across four regions.BMJ open · 2025Observational
- Measuring the strength of primary care: development of a new system of Structural Indicators for the Strength of Primary Care - SiSPC.Primary health care research & development · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors at 2 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundVarious models exist to organize out-of-hours primary care (OOH-PC). We aimed to provide an up-to-date overview of prevailing organizational models in the European Union (EU), implemented changes over the last decade and future plans. This baseline overview may provide information for countries considering remodelling their OOH-PC system.
methodsA cross-sectional web-based questionnaire among 93 key informants from EU countries, Norway and Switzerland. Key informants with expertise in the field of primary health care were invited to participate. Themes in the questionnaire were the existing organizational models for OOH-PC, model characteristics, major organizational changes implemented in the past decade and future plans.
resultsAll 26 included countries had different coexisting OOH-PC models, varying from 3 to 10 models per country. 'GP cooperative was the dominant model in most countries followed by primary care centre and rota group'. There was a large variation in characteristics between the models, but also within the models, caused by differences between countries and regions. Almost all countries had implemented changes over the past 10 years, mostly concerning the implementation of telephone triage and a change of organizational model by means of upscaling and centralization of OOH-PC. Planned changes varied from fine-tuning the prevailing OOH-PC system to radical nationwide organizational transitions in OOH-PC.
conclusionsDifferent organizational models for OOH-PC exist on international and national level. Compared with a decade ago, more primary care-oriented organizational models are now dominant. There is a trend towards upscaling and centralization; it should be evaluated whether this improves the quality of health care.
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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.