Participants and data collection

The inclusion and exclusion criteria were the same as those in the qualitative study. A flowchart of participant recruitment was shown in Fig. 1. Upon completion of the survey. Each participant received a supermarket coupon of HK$50 (US$6.5) as a token of appreciation.

Flowchart of participant recruitment

All public hospitals in Hong Kong are managed by the Hospital Authority. They are organized into seven hospital clusters based on their locations [32]. We approached all chiefs of service of these seven clusters and four of them were willing to support our study. Facilitated by the chiefs of service, a link to access an online questionnaire was sent to physicians working in the General Out-patient Clinics, and Family Medicine Integrated/Specialist Clinics within the clusters through email. Before starting the online survey, participants read a statement indicating that participation was voluntary, refusal to participate would have no effect on them, and the survey would not collect personal identifying information. Online informed consent was obtained. Among 640 physicians in the public sector being invited, 137 completed the survey (response rate: 21.4%).

A list of all physicians (4511 in total) working in the primary care settings in the private sector was retrieved from the government webpage [33] and entered into an Excel file. Using the function of selecting random cells, 680 physicians were randomly selected from the list. Hard copies of the questionnaires with a quick response (QR) code to access the same online questionnaire were sent to their contact addresses. Participants could return hard copies of the questionnaire with the written consent form by mail, or provide online consent and complete the online questionnaire. A total of 145 physicians in the private sector completed the survey, the response rate was 21.3%.

The Association of Hong Kong Nursing Staff keeps the contact information of all nurses who applied for membership in the Association in Hong Kong. Facilitated by the Association, 500 nurses working in the public sector and another 500 nurses working in the private sector in the primary care settings were randomly selected from their database. A link to access the same online questionnaire was sent to them through email. With online informed consent, 140 (response rate: 28%) and 155 (response rate: 31%) nurses in the public and private sectors completed the online survey, respectively.