Researchers from HealthPartners Detail New Studies and Findings in the Area of Managed Care (Using a Brief Tool To Assess Healthy School Environments: a Pilot Study): Managed Care

2021 DEC 17 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Fresh data on Managed Care are presented in a new report. According to news originating from Minneapolis, Minnesota, by NewsRx correspondents, research stated, “HealthPartners developed a checklist, the School Environment Index (SEI), that it uses to help elementary schools identify opportunities to improve student nutrition and increase physical activity. The objective in this pilot study was to assess whether the SEI, as administered, can be used to measure the progress of these programs.”

Financial support for this research came from Lakeview Health Foundation.

Our news journalists obtained a quote from the research from HealthPartners, “The authors focused their evaluation on the National Quality Forum measure evaluation components of reliability and validity; feasibility; and use and usability to assess the SEI’s performance. The authors used data from 214 SEIs completed by the 69 schools that participated in the school challenge in at least 1 of the years 2015 through 2019. Between 29 and 53 schools participated in a particular year. Cronbach’s a was 0.79, intraclass correlation was 0.36 (95% CI, 0.22-0.53), and sensitivity to change was 0.41 (95% CI, 0.17-0.66) per 1-year change in the standardized SEI score. The median (interquartile range) time required to complete the survey was 11 (7-21) minutes. On only 8 surveys was an entire domain of the SEI skipped or only a single response to the domain recorded. The SEI shows adequate internal consistency and sensitivity to change in this pilot evaluation. It is also feasible and useful to identify opportunities to improve practices and policies related to student nutrition and physical activity in partnership with the participating elementary schools. However, it lacks reliability as used.”

According to the news editors, the research concluded: “Increasing the number of respondents per school might moderate the impact of individual respondents and thereby increase reliability.”

This research has been peer-reviewed.

For more information on this research see: Using a Brief Tool To Assess Healthy School Environments: a Pilot Study. The American Journal of Managed Care, 2021;27(11). The American Journal of Managed Care can be contacted at: Managed Care & Healthcare Communications Llc, 666 Plainsboro Rd, Ste 300, Plainsboro, NJ 08536, USA.

The news correspondents report that additional information may be obtained from Thomas E. Kottke, HealthPartners, 8170 33RD Ave S, Ms 21110X, Minneapolis, MN 55425, United States. Additional authors for this research include Gabriela Vazquez-Benitez, Holly S. Kidrowski, Marna M. Canterbury, Allison J. Zomer and Andrea C. Anderson.

The direct object identifier (DOI) for that additional information is: https://doi.org/10.37765/ajmc.2021.88779. This DOI is a link to an online electronic document that is either free or for purchase, and can be your direct source for a journal article and its citation.

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