Table 1.

Characteristics of study subjects, medications, and primary care physicians

Characteristic	Patients with hypertension	Patients with diabetes and hypertension	Primary care physicians
			family physicians (n = 182)	general practitioners (n = 84)	all physicians (n = 266)
Patients	1,017	1,073	1,477	527	2,090
Males	488 (48.0)	471 (43.9)	626 (42.4)	290 (55.0)	959 (45.9)
Females	529 (52.0)	602 (56.1)	851 (57.6)	237 (45.0)	1,131 (54.1)
Age, years	72.6±6.8	71.7±6.5	72.0±6.6	72.5±6.6	72.1±6.6
Age range, years	65–108	65–103	65–108	65–103	65–108
Drugs prescribed for chronic conditions
Total	3,636 (75.5)	6,595 (84.7)	7,461 (81.9)	2,379 (79.9)	10,231 (81.2)
Drugs per patient	3.6±1.7	6.2±1.8	5.1±2.2	4.5±2.1	4.9±2.2
Range	1–10	2–13	1–13	1–12	1–13
Drugs prescribed for acute conditions
Total	1,180 (24.5)	1,191 (15.3)	1,650 (18.1)	600 (20.1)	2,371 (18.8)
Drugs per patient	1.2±1.3	1.1±1.3	1.1±1.3	1.1±1.3	1.1±1.3
Range	0–7	0–9	0–7	0–9	0–9
Total number of drugs prescribed
Total	4,816 (100)	7,786 (100)	9,112 (100)	2,978 (100)	12,602 (100)
Drugs per patient	4.7±2.1	7.3±2.2	6.2±2.5	5.7±2.4	6.03±2.5
Range	1–13	2–16	1–15	1–16	1–16

n (%) or mean ± SD unless otherwise stated.