Key Facts about the HowsYourHealth Family

• All websites are available for free or, for a nominal charge, they can be customized for a sponsor such as a doctor's office, community, employer, clinic, hospital, or school.
• HowsYourCare and VeryIll are modified for use on tablets so that direct Internet connection is not needed.
• HowsYourHealth can automatically have patients enter key information into a HIPPA secure DocSite_Registry. [7]

Common Questions by Sponsors of HowsYourHealth Websites

1. Why do doctor's offices, communities, employers, clinics, hospitals, or schools sponsor HowsYourHealth Websites?

   A sponsor can customize the HowsYourHealth Family of Web-sites by making "hot links" to their own web-site, adding questions, adding categories, and obtaining real-time summary reports of responses to the surveys. Bonafide sponsors can have individual responses mailed to them electronically.

   By sponsoring your own site you can also compare your results to others. (More information on customization) [8]

2. How often should people be asked to use the HowsYourHealth Web-sites?

   As a general rule, we recommend the following frequency of use:

   • HowsYourHealth -one to three years as a health "check-up." The more illness, the more frequent.
   • HowsYourCare and HowsYourBaby - at least once during the hospitalization.
   • VeryIll - often needs to be completed several times to make sure that the patient, the family, and the doctor have had adequate opportunity to discuss the plan.
   • ProblemSolving and BLOG. As frequently as needed until problems are well managed.

3. Is Self-Report Information Reliable?

   Several studies compare medical records with patient report for preventive interventions (such as mammograms, bowel cancer screening, immunizations) and generally find 80% or greater agreement.

   In one clinical setting, HowsYourHealth patient report was checked against actual bioclinical measures:

   

4. What should be done when users are asked to email information to a bonafide sponsor such as a doctor's office?

   The sponsor should develop methods to address privacy concerns about who will have access to and manage any information e-mailed to the sponsor. If the DocSite registry is used, the same concerns apply. Email address boxes should have access limited to few persons.

5. Can sponsors offer special care management programs through HowsYourHealth?

   Yes. Once the sponsor has identified a target for improvement or special care the administrative section is needs to be customized. (See Administrative Section Below). For example, early in our work we recognized that users who have pain AND emotional concerns were more bothered by their pain than those without emotional concerns. We successfully addressed this by inviting persons with pain and emotional problems to register for nurse follow-up and discussion of the exercises in the readings on pain.

   You might choose to have the invitation look like this. ARE YOU BOTHERED BY PAIN? We are offering a special program for persons who are bothered by pain. If you are interested, we ask that you register by submitting your name, address, phone number and best time to call you. A nurse will call you and talk about the problem and set up a program to help improve your control over the pain.

6. How do the HowsYourHealth Family of Websites Improve Health Care?

   They place clinicians and patients "on the same page" for issues that matter to the patients.

   But practices often have to change in many ways to be able to respond to "what matters" and help patients become better at managing concerns that are important to them. We offer, without charge, well-tested approaches to improve office practice. Go to http://www.IdealMedicalHome.org for an example of an innovative practice improvement project (and its freely available, easy-to-use methods).

7. How can I track information over time?

   Tracking requires the identification of individuals. HowsYourHealth does not store individual information. Sponsors who wish to track some information over time either import the emailed personal information into a secure data base or they use the DocSite registry for selected variables. We do not recommend using the entire content of the HowsYourHealth Websites to track because of the large number of items. (Large systems track respondents over time in several ways. Call 603 727 4001 for more information.)

8. Is there "Instant Summary" data for people who use my code?

   Yes. See sample.

9. How do I order a HowsYourHealth Website?

   You may use without charge any of the HowsYourHealth Family of Websites and link them to your own website. If you wish to customize a HowsYourHealth Website as a sponsor, you should order on line. [9] Because of size or complexity, some large organizations need special assistance to reap the greatest benefits from the HowsYourHealth Family of Websites. If you would like a consultant to contact you about HowsYourHealth, please call 1 603 727 4001. There is no charge for this service.

Copyright © 1997-2008 FNX Corp. and Trustees of Dartmouth College. All Rights Reserved.

Links and References

[1]	using HowsYourHealth

[2]	child survey adolescent survey adult survey geriatric survey

[3]	HowsYourbaby data items

[4]	health horizon data items

[5]	Problem Solving

[6]	Share ideas

[7]	DocSite registry information

[8]	Customizations

[9]

to order

[10]	login for administration and customization

[11]	Fact Sheet and Testomonials