Table 1

Basic characteristics of the sample outpatient visits*

SubgroupsNo of prescriptionsPercentage (%)
Type of patients
 Outpatient clinic910591.1
 Emergency department8959.0
Age group
 0–54304.3
 6–174804.8
 18–44418041.8
 45–64312931.3
 ≥65174217.4
 Unknown390.4
Gender of patients
 Female509951.0
 Male489348.9
 Unknown80.1
Hospital level
 Second7117.1
 Third928992.9
Region of China†
 Eastern547654.8
 Central5425.4
 Western302130.2
 North-eastern9619.6
Top five most used antibiotics
 Cefdinir1279.0
 Azithromycin1268.9
 Levofloxacin1117.8
 Cefixime1037.3
 Moxifloxacin795.6
No of diagnoses
 Non-valid diagnosis‡160.2
 One diagnosis659766.0
 Two diagnoses192119.2
 Three diagnoses7537.5
 Four diagnoses3303.3
 Five diagnoses1631.6
 >5 diagnoses2202.2
Length of diagnosis text§
 Non-valid diagnosis160.2
 1–4 characters364536.5
 5–9 characters366236.6
 10–14 characters147714.8
 15–19 characters5745.7
 ≥20 characters6266.3

  • *For rounding reasons, the sum of the percentages of some subgroups may not be exactly equal to 100%.

  • †Regions of China were divided according the National Bureau of Statistics of China. http://www.stats.gov.cn/ztjc/zthd/sjtjr/dejtjkfr/tjkp/201106/t20110613_71947.htm

  • ‡Diagnosis that contained only numbers, punctuation (eg, comma, semicolon, exclamation mark, etc), and other non-Chinese characters, told nothing about the indication for antibiotics and were defined as invalid diagnosis.

  • §Whitespace and punctuation were not counted.