Impact of Physician Referral to Health Coaching on Patient Engagement and Health Risks: An Observational Study of UPMC’s Prescription for Wellness
Purpose: Evaluate impact of physician referral to health coaching on patient engagement and health risk reduction. Design: Four-year retrospective, observational cohort study with propensity-matched pair comparisons. Setting: Integrated delivery and finance system in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Sample...
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Published in | American journal of health promotion Vol. 34; no. 4; pp. 366 - 375 |
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Main Authors | , , , , |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Los Angeles, CA
SAGE Publications
01.05.2020
American Journal of Health Promotion |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | Purpose:
Evaluate impact of physician referral to health coaching on patient engagement and health risk reduction.
Design:
Four-year retrospective, observational cohort study with propensity-matched pair comparisons.
Setting:
Integrated delivery and finance system in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Sample:
10 457 adult insured members referred to health coaching by their physician; 37 864 other members identified for health coaching through insurer-initiated outreach.
Intervention:
Practice-based, technology-supported workflow and process for physician prescribing of health coaching during regular office visit, with follow-up on patient’s progress and implementation supports.
Measures:
Patient engagement based on completion of pre-enrollment assessment, formal enrollment in health coaching, completion of required sessions, health risk levels, and number of health risks pre- and post-health coaching referral.
Analysis:
Difference-in-difference analysis to assess change in health risk levels and number of health risks pre- and post-health coaching and probability weighting to control for potential confounding between groups.
Results:
Members referred by a physician were significantly more likely to enroll in a health coaching program (21.0% vs 6.0%, P < .001) and complete the program requirements (8.5% vs 2.7%, P < .001) than when referred by insurer-initiated outreach; significant within group improvement in health risk levels from baseline (P < .001) was observed for both the groups.
Conclusions:
Patients are significantly more likely to engage in health coaching when a referral is made by a physician; engagement in health coaching significantly improves health risk levels. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-2 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Undefined-1 ObjectType-Feature-3 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0890-1171 2168-6602 |
DOI: | 10.1177/0890117119900588 |