Table 1.
Physician psychosocial beliefs about weight, diet, exercise, and smoking counseling
| PHYSICIAN PSYCHOSOCIAL BELIEFS | HEALTH BEHAVIOR |
||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Estimated proportion (%) OR (95% CI) |
Weight | Diet | Exercise | Smoking | p-value |
|
Barriers to discussing (% agree/strongly agree) | |||||
| Too much time is required | 53% 1.8 (1.0–3.4) |
73% 4.4 (2.1–9.4) |
38% 1.0 (0.6–1.8) |
38% ref |
0.0002 |
| Patient may not be interested in discussing | 40% 0.6 (0.3–1.1) |
44% 0.6 (0.4–1.2) |
50% 0.8 (0.4–1.6) |
53% ref |
0.37 |
| I do not feel adequately trained | 13% 1.8 (0.6–5.4) |
40% 8.2 (2.7–25.3) |
10% 1.4 (0.3–5.5) |
8% ref |
0.0002 |
| Health problems other than those related to this topic require attention | 55% 0.9 (0.6–1.4) |
60% 1.1 (0.7–1.7) |
58% 1.0 (0.7–1.5) |
58% ref |
0.84 |
| This topic may be too embarrassing for patients to discuss | 38% 11.4 (2.9–45.1) |
20% 4.7 (1.1–21.2) |
23% 5.5 (1.5–20.1) |
5% ref |
0.004 |
| Overall barrier score | 33% 4.3 (1.5–12.3) |
28% 3.4 (1.2–9.7) |
13% 1.3 (0.5–3.0) |
10% ref |
0.003 |
| Comfort discussing topic (% very comfortable) | 53% 0.7 (0.4–1.1) |
43% 0.4 (0.3–0.7) |
60% 0.9 (0.6–1.3) |
63% ref |
0.004 |
| Confident discussing topic (mostly/extremely confident) | 70% 1.1 (0.5–2.4) |
40% 0.3 (0.2–0.6) |
63% 0.8 (0.4–1.7) |
68% ref |
0.001 |
|
Outcome expectations of the discussion (very/extremely likely) | |||||
| To what extent do you expect that your patients will listen to your advice on this topic? | 33% 1.4 (0.7–3.2) |
25% 1.0 (0.4–2.5) |
33% 1.4 (0.6–3.4) |
25% ref |
0.78 |
| To what extent do you expect that your patients will become upset when you counsel them on this topic? | 5% 2.1 (0.2–24.6) |
5% 2.1 (0.2–24.6) |
3% 1.0 (0.1–17.2) |
3% ref |
0.87 |
| To what extent do you expect that your patients will follow your advice on this topic? | 8% 1.0 (0.2–4.1) |
8% 1.0 (0.2–4.1) |
8% 1.0 (0.4–2.7) |
8% ref |
1.00 |
This study was conducted from December 2006 through June 2008 at five community-based primary care practices in central North Carolina.
The values in the p-value column represent the overall association of physician’s psychosocial beliefs across behaviors.
Odd ratios and 95% CI from GEE models by health behavior topic are the comparison of physicians’ psychosocial beliefs for weight, diet, and exercise to smoking.
CI = confidence interval; GEE = generalized estimating equation; OR = odds ratio.