TABLE 1.

Key definitions

Terms	Definitions
Family doctors	Refers to the doctor whom respondents typically see for routine care and non-emergent problems; includes family doctors, family physicians, general practitioners or medical doctors but does not include dentists, eye doctors, gynaecologists or obstetricians.
Attached patients	Respondents who have family doctors.
Unattached patients	Respondents who do not have family doctors.
Routine care	Refers to regular check-ups or monitoring of ongoing health issues.
Immediate care	Refers to urgent health problems that require immediate attention, for example, when sick.
Overall care	Includes routine care, immediate care, care to obtain health information, or for advice regarding whether care is necessary.
Walk-in clinic visits	Refers to any visits to walk-in clinics for a health-related reason.
Emergency department visits	Refers to any visits to emergency departments for any health-related problems.
Time to see family doctor for immediate care	Based on the number of days it took respondents to obtain an appointment from a family doctor when they were sick.
Urban/rural geography	Urban refers to continuously built-up areas with a minimum population of 1,000 and a minimum population density of 400 per square kilometres. All other areas are defined as rural. Derived from respondent's postal code using the Postal Code Conversion File (Statistics Canada 2009).