practitioners usually give advice and seldom refer the patient to other medical specialists for additional assessment. From the above-mentioned study,11 it is not possible to evaluate whether patients would benefit if general practitioners had a different sports policy, because the severity of the sports-related problems was not registered. This complicates comparison between existing sports-related problems and current sport injuries as seen in a sports physician’s office. Until now, it remains unclear why athletes decide to “refer themselves” to a sports physician without first consulting their general practitioner. Therefore, to obtain more data on the numbers and characteristics of “self-referrers” to sports physicians, the present study compared this subgroup with patients referred to a sports physician via another health professional. Materials and methods This study had a cross-sectional design and was based on a selective sample. All new patients visiting the Sports Medical Center at the University Medical Center Groningen during September 2010 were registered in a digital database, based on information collected from their paper and electronic medical records. The patients were divided into four groups: patients referred by a general practitioner (group 1), patients referred by physiotherapists/parameTable 1. Baseline characteristics of the study population by referral group Referred by Total population (n = 234) Patients consulting a sports physician (%) Mean age, years (SD) Gender (% male) Sport level (% top sport) Etiology injury (% acute) Previous additional tests (%) Previous treatment (%) 100.0 33.7 ± 14.9 59.1 6.8 43.3 31.4 52.9 Self-referrers (n = 92) 39.3 34.6 ± 14.3 57.8 8.9 43.8 28.1 40.7 Notes: †Tested with analysis of variance; ‡tested with Chi-square test; *statistically significant. Abbreviations: GP, general practitioner; SD, standard deviation. Table 2A. Sports practiced by each referral group (%) Referred by Total population (n = 230) Soccer Running Martial arts Fitness (Nordic) walking Bicycle racing Hockey Korfball Horse riding Other Abbreviation: GP, general practitioner. 26.5 19.1 6.1 4.3 3.9 3.0 2.2 2.2 2.2 30.5 Self-referrers 21.1 28.9 6.7 2.2 3.3 1.1 2.2 2.2 0 32.3 Referred by GP 28.9 15.5 5.2 6.2 5.2 5.2 2.1 3.1 4.1 24.5 physiotherapist/ paramedic 42.9 7.1 3.6 7.1 3.6 0 3.6 0 0 32.1 Referred by medical specialist 13.3 6.7 13.3 0 0 6.7 0 0 6.7 53.1 Referred by GP (n = 98) 41.9 32.7 ± 15.3 56.7 6.2 41.1 28.4 55.2 physiotherapist/ paramedic (n = 29) 12.2 33.2 ± 16.4 71.4 4.2 50.0 18.5 71.4 Referred by medical specialist (n = 15) P value 6.5 36.1 ± 13.7 60 0 46.7 93.3 73.3 0.75† 0.56‡ 0.49‡ 0.81‡ 0.76‡ 0.00*,‡ nummer 1 | maart 2013 | Sport & Geneeskunde 27 Pagina 26
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