Socio-demographic determinants and effect of structured personal diabetes care: a 19-year follow-up of the randomized controlled study diabetes Care in General Practice (DCGP)

Table 3 The effect of structured personal care on behavioral, clinical, process of care and biochemical variables according to socio-demographic group

	Significance (p-value)^a of the modification of the intervention effect by the various socio-demographic variables
	Educational level: Basic vs. higher	Residence: Rural vs. urban	Employment: Out of labor market vs. in labor market	Civil status: Single vs. cohabiting
Patient attitudes^b
Altered habits after diagnosis	0.22	0.08	0.50	0.33
Not full diabetes diet	0.53	0.74	0.78	0.45
Performs home blood/urinary glucose monitoring	0.17	0.89	0.94	0.88
For the patient in question the GP’s opinion^b
Patient’s motivation; good or very good for best possible control and treatment over past year^,	0.34	0.07	0.19	0.80
Clinical
Body mass index	0.29	0.50	0.15	0.65
Systolic blood pressure	0.47	0.23	0.71	0.54
Biochemical
Hemoglobin A1c	0.48	0.31	0.91	0.97
Total cholesterol	0.05(↓)	0.67	0.83	0.79
Serum creatinine	0.42	0.05 (↓)	0.69	0.22
Micro- or proteinuria^c	0.81	0.55	0.47	0.92
Behavioral^b
Sedentary (leisure time) physical activity	0.90	0.20	0.57	0.67
Current smoking	0.44	0.41	0.56	0.59
Process of care^b
Consultations/year	0.93	0.26	0.86	0.53
Diabetes-related consultations/year	0.91	0.18	0.56	0.04 (↑)
Ever treated at diabetic clinic	0.95	0.17	0.87	0.32
Glucose-lowering drugs^b	0.26	0.96	0.60	0.33
Antihypertensive drugs^b	0.33	0.18	0.55	0.98
Lipid-lowering drugs^b	0.82	0.04 (↓)	0.40	0.40

^aP-value from a test whether the effect of the intervention differs between socio-demographic groups (e.g. patients with basic school only vs higher education), adjusted for age, sex and diabetes duration. Clustering with general practice is accounted for by the use of generalized estimating equations. Arrows (↓) indicate the direction of the effect modification for cases where p < 0.05, e.g. the intervention lowered serum creatinine more in patients living in rural areas than in patients living in urban areas. ^bData from questionnaires to patients and their general practitioners. ^cProteinuria > =15 mg/L

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