The regional medical campus model and rural family medicine practice in British Columbia: a retrospective longitudinal cohort study

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Figure 1:
Flowchart of study sample at each stage of training.

Table 1:

Study sample at each stage of training by campus location

Characteristic	Total	Main campus	IMP-RMC	NMP-RMC
Entry into UBC MD training, no.	904	699	104	101
Sex, female, no. (%)^*	508 (56.2)	383 (54.8)	61 (58.7)	64 (63.4)
Age, yr, mean ± SD	25 ± 5.2	24 ± 3.3	25 ± 3.6	27 ± 5.2
Rural background, no. (%)^*^†	77 (8.9)	40 (6.0)	11 (11.0)	26 (26.8)
Residency training, no.^‡	888	689	100	99
Family medicine, no. (%)^§	320 (36.0)	221 (32.1)	45 (45.0)	54 (54.5)
Specialties other than family medicine, no. (%)^§	568 (64.0)	468 (67.9)	55 (55.0)	45 (45.5)
Practising family medicine, no.	309	211	42	56
Rural practice, no. (%)^¶	40 (13.0)	14 (6.6)	7 (16.7)	19 (33.9)
Urban practice, no. (%)^¶	269 (87.0)	197 (93.4)	35 (83.3)	37 (66.1)

Note: IMP-RMC = Island Medical Program regional medical campus, MD = medical degree, NMP-RMC = Northern Medical Campus regional medical program, SD = standard deviation, UBC = University of British Columbia. The percentages in this table are column percentages.
↵* Column percentages were calculated using the number of students who entered into UBC MD training as the denominator.
↵† Data were missing for 35 students (27 from main campus, 4 from IMP-RMC and 4 from NMP-RMC).
↵‡ A χ² test was performed to determine whether practice specialty was associated with campus location. Campus location was significantly associated with specialty choice, χ² (2, 888) = 22.89, p < 0.05.
↵§ Column percentages were calculated using the number of students who entered into residency training as the denominator·
↵¶ Column percentages were calculated using the number of students practising family medicine as the denominator.

Table 2:

Descriptives and differences in explanatory variables according to family medicine practice location

Characteristic	Rural practice	Urban practice	p value	Effect size^*
Sex, no (%)
Female (n = 187)	22 (11.8)	165 (88.2)	0.4	0.04
Male (n = 122)	18 (14.8)	104 (85.2)	0.4	0.04
Rural background, no. (%)^†
Rural (n = 38)	12 (31.6)	26 (68.4)	< 0.001	0.22
Urban (n = 263)	27 (10.3)	236 (89.7)	< 0.001	0.22
Age at entry into UBC MD training, mean ± SD	27.2 ± 5.1	25.4 ± 4.0	0.01	0.39
Campus, no. (%)
Main campus (n = 211)	14 (6.6)	197 (93.4)	< 0.001	0.32
IMP-RMC (n = 42)	7 (16.7)	35 (83.3)
NMP-RMC (n = 56)	19 (33.9)	37 (66.1)

Note: IMP-RMC = Island Medical Program regional medical campus, MD = medical degree, NMP-RMC = Northern Medical Campus regional medical program, SD = standard deviation, UBC = University of British Columbia.
↵* Cramér’s V was calculated to determine effect size for sex, rural background and campus; Cohen’s d was calculated to determine effect size for age at entry into medical school.
↵† Data were missing for 8 students.

Table 3:

Summary of logistic regression analysis explaining rural family medicine

Outcome	β	SE	Wald statistic	Odds ratio (95% CI)
Sex	−0.55	0.38	2.08	0.58 (0.28–1.22)
Age	0.03	0.04	0.56	1.03 (0.95–1.12)
Rural background	0.95	0.45	4.57	2.59 (1.08–6.21)
Campus			15.13
IMP-RMC	1.18	0.51	5.28	3.24 (1.19–8.83)
NMP-RMC	1.68	0.45	14.17	5.38 (2.24–12.91)

Note: CI = confidence interval, IMP-RMC = Island Medical Program regional medical campus, NMP-RMC = Northern Medical Campus regional medical program, OR = odds ratio, SE = standard error.