Baseline Characteristics of Family Medicine PDs (Responses by US Region*, Collected between February 2015 and March 2015)
| Characteristic | Overall (N = 273) | Northeast (N = 52) | Midwest (N = 58) | South (N = 96) | West (N = 67) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Residency Program Context | |||||
| Size of community (population) | |||||
| <150,000 (n) | 123 | 39 | 25 | 44 | 15 |
| 150,000–500,000 (n) | 64 | 7 | 17 | 20 | 20 |
| >500,000 (n) | 86 | 6 | 16 | 32 | 32 |
| Proportion of community-based programs (%) | 78 | 84 | 73 | 77 | 82 |
| Average age of program (years) | 32.7 | 35.2 | 33.9 | 33.8 | 28.2 |
| Proportion of programs with > 25% graduates from non-US medical school (%) | 48 | 63 | 46 | 55 | 28 |
| Residency PD characteristics | |||||
| Male (%) | 64 | 61 | 71 | 64 | 60 |
| Tenure (years) | 6.3 | 7.4 | 6 | 6.1 | 6 |
| PD attitudes toward statements pertaining to HCV treatment-related ethical issues (Agree responses, %) | |||||
| “Treatment should be an option for all patients with HCV regardless of cost” | 70 | 65 | 74 | 69 | 72 |
| “State Medicaid programs' decision to limit access to HCV treatment will worsen racial and ethnic disparities in health care” | 70 | 63 | 72 | 74 | 69 |
| “It is unethical to deny access to treatment based on the patient's past or current behavior” | 47 | 44 | 50 | 52 | 39 |
| “It is unethical that a potentially lifesaving medicine is so highly priced” | 69 | 52 | 79 | 70 | 69 |
| “Patients with active substance abuse should be offered HCV treatment” | 38 | 42 | 38 | 42 | 28 |
| “Benefit outweighs cost only for patients with advanced liver disease” | 35 | 38 | 26 | 42 | 30 |
| Moral distress (To what extent do you experience moral distress when you are unable to offer hepatitis C treatment to patients due to them not meeting current eligibility criteria?) | |||||
| Moral distress (high level) | 61 | 60 | 60 | 57 | 69 |
↵* US regions as classified by the Center for Disease Control (CDC), https://www.cdc.gov/std/stats11/census.htm.
PD, program director.
HCV, Hepatitis C virus.