We want to thank Dr. Barbara Starfield for her insightful commentary about our paper in CMAJ May 26. While we agree with the issues she raised, her article contains a misleading statement that the higher rate of visits to emergency departments in capitation was observed only in rural areas. This appears to be the case in Table 4 of the print version, which was not adjusted for provider or patient characteristics. In the online version, however, we state that “after adjustment for physician and patient characteristics, we found that patients in capitation practices continued to have higher rates of use of emergency department services than patients in enhanced fee-for-service practices. This finding was consistent and significant across all 3 geographic locations.” Not presented in the paper were the values adjusted for physician and patient.
Footnotes
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For the full letter, go to: www.cmaj.ca/cgi/eletters/180/11/1091#136900