ArticleBMC health services research2020
Engagement in primary health care among marginalized people who use drugs in Ottawa, Canada.
Article in BMC health services research, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 20 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
20 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Patient- and Clinician-Related Factors Associated With the Reduction in Opioid Use Among Adults With Chronic Non-Cancer Pain: A Systematic Review.Clinical pharmacology and therapeutics · 2026Pooled it
- Examining Access to Primary Care for People With Opioid Use Disorder in Ontario, Canada: A Randomized Clinical Trial.JAMA network open · 2022Trial
- Primary Care Attachment and Long-Term Mortality in Burn Survivors: A Population-Based Cohort Study.Journal of burn care & research : official publication of the American Burn Association · 2026Article
- Relationship Between Palliative Care and Location of Death Among People With Opioid Use Disorder: A Retrospective Cohort Study.Journal of palliative care · 2026Article
- "With this you're not chained down to something": contrasting experiences of opioid agonist treatment and safer supply program participation among people receiving prescribed safer supply.Harm reduction journal · 2026Article
- Evaluation of a Pilot mHealth Intervention to Engage Primary Care Clients at an Urban Clinic Serving Marginalized Populations: Mixed-Methods Cohort Study.JMIR mHealth and uHealth · 2025Article
- Article
- Association Between Inpatient Medication Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder and Reduced One-Year All-Cause Mortality in Patients With Invasive Bacterial Infections.Open forum infectious diseases · 2025Article
- Scaling up hepatitis C testing and linkage-to-care among people who use drugs: lessons learned from a pilot project implemented at a supervised consumption site.BMC health services research · 2025Article
- "It's Like A Partnership": Exploring the Primary Care Experiences and Patient-Defined Goals of People Who Use Drugs.Journal of general internal medicine · 2024Article
- Access of older people to primary health care in low and middle-income countries: A systematic scoping review.PloS one · 2024Article
- Violence Victimization, Homelessness, and Severe Mental Illness Among People Who Use Opioids in Three U.S. Cities.Journal of interpersonal violence · 2023Article
- Estimated Clinical Outcomes and Cost-effectiveness Associated With Provision of Addiction Treatment in US Primary Care Clinics.JAMA network open · 2023Article
- Sex trafficking survivors' experiences with the healthcare system during exploitation: A qualitative study.PloS one · 2023Article
- "They're all struggling as well": social and economic barriers and facilitators to self-managing chronic illness among marginalized people who use drugs.International journal of qualitative studies on health and well-being · 2022Article
- Primary care embedded within permanent supportive housing for people who use substances: A qualitative study examining healthcare access in Vancouver, Canada.Health & social care in the community · 2022Article
- Suboptimal nonmedical qualities of primary care linked with care avoidance among people who use drugs in a Canadian setting amid an integrated health care reform.Journal of substance abuse treatment · 2022Article
- Self-reported impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic among people who use drugs: a rapid assessment study in Montreal, Canada.Harm reduction journal · 2022Article
- HIV related stigma associated with social support, alcohol use disorders, depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation among people living with HIV: a systematic review and meta-analysis.International journal of mental health systems · 2022Article
- Health Status and Preventive Health Services Among Reproductive-Aged Women in Treatment for Opioid Use Disorder.Women's health reports (New Rochelle, N.Y.) · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
13 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundThere may be less primary health care engagement among people who use drugs (PWUD) than among the general population, even though the former have greater comorbidity and more frequent use of emergency department care. We investigated factors associated with primary care engagement among PWUD.
methodsThe Participatory Research in Ottawa: Understanding Drugs (PROUD) cohort study meaningfully engaged and trained people with lived experience to recruit and survey marginalized PWUD between March-December 2013. We linked this survey data to provincial-level administrative databases held at ICES. We categorized engagement in primary care over the 2 years prior to survey completion as: not engaged (< 3 outpatient visits to the same family physician) versus engaged in care (3+ visits to the same family physician). We used multivariable logistic regression to determine factors associated with engagement in primary care.
resultsCharacteristics of 663 participants included a median age of 43 years, 76% men, and 67% living in the two lowest income quintile neighborhoods. Despite high comorbidity and a median of 4 (interquartile range 0-10) primary care visits in the year prior to survey completion, only 372 (56.1%) were engaged in primary care. Engagement was most strongly associated with the following factors: receiving provincial benefits, including disability payments (adjusted odds ratio [AOR] 4.14 (95% confidence interval [CI] 2.30 to 7.43)) or income assistance (AOR 3.69 (95% CI 2.00 to 6.81)), having ever taken methadone (AOR 3.82 (95% CI 2.28 to 6.41)), mental health comorbidity (AOR 3.43 (95% CI 2.19 to 5.38)), and having stable housing (AOR 2.09 (95% CI 1.29 to 3.38)).
conclusionsDespite high comorbidity, engagement in primary care among PWUD was low. Our findings suggest that social care (housing, disability, and income support) and mental health care are associated with improved primary care continuity; integration of these care systems with primary care and opioid substitution therapy may lessen the significant morbidity and acute care use among PWUD.
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.