Table 1.
Characteristics of patients seeing physicians for pre-operative visits or general medical exams in the U.S., 1997-2010
| Pre-operative visits | General medical exams | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Characteristic | Unweighted No. | Weighted Annual No. | Percent, % | Unweighted No. | Weighted Annual No. | Percent, % | P value |
| All visits | 8,845 | 10,266,817 | 100 | 29,287 | 49,496,063 | 100 | |
| Age, yrs | |||||||
| 18-44 | 2,859 | 3,073,666 | 29.9 | 10,108 | 14,876,146 | 30.1 | |
| 45-64 | 3,530 | 3,749,175 | 36.5 | 10,912 | 19,310,498 | 39.0 | |
| >=65 | 2,456 | 3,443,976 | 33.5 | 8,267 | 15,309,420 | 30.9 | 0.283 |
| Sex | |||||||
| Female | 5,469 | 6,657,816 | 64.8 | 17,798 | 28,661,083 | 57.9 | |
| Male | 3,376 | 3,609,001 | 35.2 | 11,489 | 20,834,980 | 42.1 | <0.001 |
| Race/ethnicity | |||||||
| Non-Hispanic white | 4,520 | 5,750,637 | 56.0 | 14,684 | 28,279,841 | 57.1 | |
| Non-Hispanic black | 1,114 | 674,070 | 6.6 | 4,143 | 4,581,156 | 9.3 | 0.001 |
| Hispanic | 953 | 683,112 | 6.7 | 3,091 | 2,815,335 | 5.7 | 0.055 |
| Other/unknown | 2,258 | 3,158,998 | 30.8 | 7,369 | 13,819,732 | 27.9 | 0.136 |
| Insurance | |||||||
| Private | 3,592 | 4,986,042 | 48.6 | 11,870 | 27,646,706 | 55.9 | |
| Medicare | 2,316 | 2,878,154 | 28.0 | 7,563 | 13,345,849 | 27.0 | 0.002 |
| Medicaid | 1,292 | 605,670 | 5.9 | 4,665 | 2,929,045 | 5.9 | 0.152 |
| Other | 815 | 803,900 | 7.8 | 2,536 | 3,488,643 | 7.0 | 0.023 |
| Uninsured | 830 | 830 | 9.7 | 2,653 | 2,085,820 | 4.2 | <0.001 |
| Region | |||||||
| Northeast | 2,050 | 1,921,551 | 18.7 | 8,944 | 11,207,994 | 22.6 | |
| Midwest | 1,761 | 1,994,323 | 19.4 | 7,040 | 11,710,212 | 23.7 | 0.952 |
| South | 2,734 | 3,704,982 | 36.1 | 8,666 | 17,368,247 | 35.1 | 0.03 |
| West | 2,300 | 2,645,962 | 25.8 | 4,637 | 9,209,610 | 18.6 | <0.001 |
| Office/clinic setting | |||||||
| Urban | 8,070 | 9,021,071 | 87.9 | 25,583 | 41,957,506 | 84.8 | |
| Rural | 775 | 1,245,746 | 12.1 | 3,704 | 7,538,557 | 15.2 | 0.006 |
| Smoker | |||||||
| No | 3,487 | 4,587,678 | 44.7 | 10,069 | 19,805,561 | 40.0 | |
| Yes | 899 | 929,895 | 9.1 | 2,471 | 4,173,282 | 8.4 | 0.63 |
| Unknown | 4,459 | 4,749,243 | 46.3 | 16,747 | 25,517,220 | 51.6 | 0.001 |
| Visit diagnosis | |||||||
| Hypertension | 609 | 808,162 | 7.9 | 5,550 | 10,553,887 | 21.3 | <0.001 |
| Coronary artery disease | 300 | 340,893 | 3.3 | 1,356 | 2,406,372 | 4.9 | <0.001 |
| Diabetes | 318 | 378,773 | 3.7 | 2,843 | 4,568,556 | 9.2 | <0.001 |
| Chronic kidney disease | 187 | 118,588 | 1.2 | 257 | 330,871 | 0.7 | 0.039 |
| COPD | 73 | 117,875 | 1.1 | 519 | 971,150 | 2.0 | 0.005 |
Abbreviations: CI, confidence interval; Avg., average; No., number; ASA, American Society of Anesthesiologists; CHD, coronary heart disease; COPD, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; Thous., thousands; unadj., unadjusted; adj., adjusted
Notes: P values calculated with Wald chi-square test from simple ordinal (age) or binomial/multinomial logistic regression models comparing patients in pre-operative visits to patients in general medical exams.