End-of-life care in Germany: Study design, methods and first results of the EPACS study (Establishment of Hospice and Palliative Care Services in Germany)

Table 1 Types of reaction to the questionnaire of the EPACS study stratified by the socio-demographic characteristics of the deceased, n = 4967

	Total	Answered questionnaires		Non-participation		No reaction		Returned to sender		p value
	n	n	%	n	%	n	%	n	%
Sex										< 0.001
Male	2,324	612	26.3	440	18.9	893	38.4	379	16.3
Female	2,643	766	29.0	305	11.5	817	30.9	755	28.6
Marital Status										< 0.001
Married	2,066	654	31.7	436	21.1	844	40.9	132	6.4
Widowed	2,121	594	28.0	224	10.6	630	29.7	673	31.7
Divorced	310	47	15.2	25	8.1	85	27.4	153	49.4
Unmarried	469	83	17.7	60	12.8	150	32.0	176	37.5
Nationality										0.16
German	4,886	1,364	27.9	733	15.0	1,675	34.3	1,114	22.8
Other	81	14	17.3	12	14.8	35	43.2	20	24.7
Age										< 0.001
0 - 39 years	85	14	16.5	21	24.7	35	41,2	15	17.6
40 - 49 years	153	37	24.2	13	8.5	61	39.9	42	27.5
50 - 59 years	307	84	27.4	37	12.1	132	43.0	54	17.6
60 - 69 years	631	185	29.3	114	18.1	223	35.3	109	17.3
70 - 79 years	1,187	322	27.1	219	18.4	469	39.5	177	14.9
80 - 89 years	1,904	526	27.6	259	13.6	627	32.9	492	25.8
≥ 90 years	700	210	30.0	82	11.7	163	23.3	245	35.0

ISSN: 1472-684X