Table 2:

RDD estimates-Effect of the referral letter on 2013-17 change in systolic and diastolic blood pressure, and probability of being hypertensive, diagnosed with hypertension, and treated for hypertension in 2017

Specification	Effects	Std. errors	P-values	OB-	OB+	N-	N+
	A. Change in systolic blood pressure 2013–17
Linear	−12.88**	5.947	0.030	23.57	18.43	312	108
Linear with controls	−14.28**	5.952	0.016	21.30	18.72	275	107
	B. Change in diastolic blood pressure 2013–17
Linear	−5.503*	2.849	0.053	22.60	19.32	294	109
Linear with controls	−5.790**	2.730	0.034	20.33	21.66	256	115
	C. Probability of being hypertensive in 2017
Linear	−0.199*	0.114	0.079	20.403	19.734	260	109
Linear with controls	−0.225**	0.112	0.044	20.693	19.981	256	108
	D. Diagnosed with hypertension in 2017
Linear	0.241**	0.106	0.023	22.22	13.29	294	87
Linear with controls	0.201**	0.101	0.046	19.25	14.50	229	90
	E. Treated for hypertension in 2017
Linear	0.045	0.073	0.538	16.15	15.56	192	96
Linear with controls	0.038	0.072	0.598	14.89	15.53	160	95

Notes: The table shows estimates of the effect of receiving a referral card in 2013 on blood pressure related outcomes using a regression discontinuity design. Change in systolic blood pressure is the difference between the average of the three systolic blood pressure measures in 2017 and in 2013. Change in diastolic blood pressure is the difference between the average of the three diastolic blood pressure measures in 2017 and in 2013. We define someone as being hypertensive if the mean systolic or diastolic blood pressure measurements was greater or equal to 140 and 90, respectively. Diagnosis is a dummy equal to 1 if the respondent has been diagnosed by a medical professional in the last two years (2017 survey). Medication is a dummy equal to 1 if the respondent is currently taking medication for blood pressure (2017 survey). All these specifications use triangular weights and first order local polynomials. OB- and OB+ represent the optimal bandwidths below and above the cutoffs, respectively. N- and N+ represent the number of observations included in the optimal bandwidths below and above the cutoffs, respectively. The change in systolic and diastolic blood pressure is mean(x₁, x₂, x₃)²⁰¹⁷ -mean(x₁, x₂, x₃)₂₀₁₃ with x = {systolic, diastolic}. We use a Mean Square Error (MSE) optimal bandwidth selector. Specifications with controls includes a sex dummy, age and region dummies.

^*p < 0.1,

^**p < 0.05,

^***p < 0.01.