*2.1. Study Design and Participants*

This cross-sectional study was conducted using a comprehensive online survey that was shared via the Google Forms® platform. All current family physicians (physicians that work in family medicine practice) and family medicine residents (physicians in the current residency program in the field of family medicine) in the Republic of Croatia with minimally 2 years of working experience were eligible for inclusion. The link for the survey was shared via the official e-mail addresses of family medicine practices in the country, and via e-mails of family medicine associations in Croatia. Data were collected during the "third wave" of the COVID-19 pandemic in Croatia, between April and June of 2021. The main source of information of the family medicine practices in our country was the database available from the Croatian Institute for Health Insurance with 2337 listed practices with basic information. Afterwards, the link for the survey was sent to the acquired e-mail addresses that were collected after a rigorous search via several different resources (official online information, telephone calls, work contacts). In addition, contact was made with family medicine associations in Croatia, who forwarded the link to the survey through their channels. A total of 492 responses were collected; however, 9 of them were discarded due to reported FPs' working experience being under 2 years. Hence, the overall response rate in this study was 21.0%, even though potential participants were reminded three time via e-mail and some of them via telephone calls.

All important information regarding this investigation was presented to invited FPs in the introduction of the survey and accompanying e-mail, while potential questions could be asked online. The identity of all included participants was secured with the according settings in Google forms®, while obtained informed consent was considered when the final submission of the answers was provided. The investigation was performed in accordance with the ethical standards of Declaration of Helsinki, and it was approved by the Ethics Committees of University of Split School of Medicine (No: 2181-198-03-04-21-0027) and Health Centre of the Split-Dalmatia County (No: 2181-149/01-21/01). Participation was voluntary, without compensation, while the asked questions did not include personal information.
