Table 1.
The means, relative differences in means (difference %), and standardised mean differences (SMD) for the users of public digital clinics versus the users of traditional public primary care (PPC) clinics, including prior health care use in traditional PPC, private health care (HC) and occupational (occup.) HC, their sociodemographic characteristics, and the shares of potentially vulnerable people in different user groups. Total population refers to all residents in the region who have access to both traditional and digital healthcare services. Individuals were divided into two groups based on their use of public primary care after the launch of the public digital clinic: 1) digital clinic users who had used the public digital clinic at least once during the follow-up period after the launch, and 2) traditional public primary care (PPC) users who had at least one contact with traditional public primary care (including telephone contacts) but no contacts with the public digital clinic during the same period. Prior healthcare use was measured for 12 months before the digital clinic’s launch. The follow-up period ranged from 9 to 12 months, depending on the launch date of the digital clinic.
| Digital clinic users | Traditional PPC users | Total population | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Individuals | 162.298 | 694.963 | 1,599,588 | Digital clinic users vs traditional PPC users | |
| Digital clinic contacts | 324.189 | 0 | 324.189 | ||
| Traditional PPC contacts | 725.094 | 3,484,215 | 4,209,309 | ||
| Mean | Mean | Mean | Difference (%) | SMD | |
| A. Prior healthcare use (number of days with contact) | |||||
| Traditional PPC contacts | 4.33 | 4.68 | 2.91 | −7.5 | −0.05 |
| Private HC: telemedicine contacts | 0.16 | 0.09 | 0.11 | +75.9 | +0.11 |
| Private HC: in-person visits | 0.47 | 0.38 | 0.40 | +24.7 | +0.08 |
| Occup. HC: telemedicine contacts | 0.72 | 0.39 | 0.56 | +81.9 | +0.17 |
| Occup. HC: in-person visits | 0.69 | 0.41 | 0.59 | +70.0 | +0.17 |
| B. Sociodemographic covarities | |||||
| Age (in years) | 38.67 | 49.58 | 43.56 | −22.0 | −0.45 |
| Is female | 64.6% | 53.1% | 50.3% | +21.7 | +0.24 |
| Language: Finnish | 95.2% | 94.0¤ | 93.2% | +1.2 | +0.05 |
| Language: Swedish | 1.9% | 1.9% | 2.0% | +1.0 | <0.01 |
| Relationship or widowed | 36.6% | 45.9% | 40.5% | −20.3 | −0.19 |
| Living in a city | 70.4% | 54.8% | 62.4% | +28.4 | +0.33 |
| Distance to nearest clinic (km) | 3.11 | 3.50 | 3.39 | −11.1 | −0.11 |
| Tertiary education | 30.2% | 22.0% | 26.3% | +37.3 | +0.19 |
| Pensioner | 21.3% | 42.5% | 27.4% | −50.0 | −0.47 |
| In labour market | 49.6% | 34.2% | 46.7% | +44.7 | +0.31 |
| Income (thousands of euros) | 29.18 | 27.80 | 29.96 | +5.0 | +0.06 |
| C. Potentially vulnerable groups | |||||
| Insulin treated diabetes, aged 40+ | 6.2% | 12.4% | 7.4% | −49.8 | −0.21 |
| Common chronic disease | 24.8% | 36.8% | 25.4% | −32.5 | −0.26 |
| Multimorbidity | 4.4% | 8.7% | 5.2% | −49.4 | −0.18 |
| 1st income quintile | 20.5% | 23.9% | 20.9% | −14.2 | −0.08 |
| Unemployment spell | 13.4% | 9.5% | 9.5% | +40.8 | +0.12 |
| Language: other | 3.0% | 4.1% | 4.8% | −27.9 | −0.06 |
| Aged 80 or more | 2.8% | 9.8% | 6.2% | −71.3 | −0.29 |