TY - JOUR T1 - Characteristics of primary care practices associated with high quality of care JF - Canadian Medical Association Journal JO - CMAJ SP - E590 LP - E596 DO - 10.1503/cmaj.121802 VL - 185 IS - 12 AU - Marie-Dominique Beaulieu AU - Jeannie Haggerty AU - Pierre Tousignant AU - Janet Barnsley AU - William Hogg AU - Robert Geneau AU - Éveline Hudon AU - Réjean Duplain AU - Jean-Louis Denis AU - Lucie Bonin AU - Claudio Del Grande AU - Natalyia Dragieva Y1 - 2013/09/03 UR - http://www.cmaj.ca/content/185/12/E590.abstract N2 - Background: No primary practice care model has been shown to be superior in achieving high-quality primary care. We aimed to identify the organizational characteristics of primary care practices that provide high-quality primary care.Methods: We performed a cross-sectional observational study involving a stratified random sample of 37 primary care practices from 3 regions of Quebec. We recruited 1457 patients who had 1 of 2 chronic care conditions or 1 of 6 episodic care conditions. The main outcome was the overall technical quality score. We measured organizational characteristics by use of a validated questionnaire and the Team Climate Inventory. Statistical analyses were based on multilevel regression modelling.Results: The following characteristics were strongly associated with overall technical quality of care score: physician remuneration method (27.0; 95% confidence interval [CI] 19.0–35.0), extent of sharing of administrative resources (7.6; 95% CI 0.8–14.4), presence of allied health professionals (15.3; 95% CI 5.4–25.2) and/or specialist physicians (19.6; 95% CI 8.3–30.9), the presence of mechanisms for maintaining or evaluating competence (7.7; 95% CI 3.0–12.4) and average organizational access to the practice (4.9; 95% CI 2.6–7.2). The number of physicians (1.2; 95% CI 0.6–1.8) and the average Team Climate Inventory score (1.3; 95% CI 0.1–2.5) were modestly associated with high-quality care.Interpretation: We identified a common set of organizational characteristics associated with high-quality primary care. Many of these characteristics are amenable to change through practice-level organizational changes. ER -