Tailored Educational Approaches for Consumer Health: A Model to Address Health Promotion in an Era of Personalized Medicine

Abstract

Purpose:

To develop a model, based on market segmentation, to improve the quality and efficiency of health promotion materials and programs.

Design:

Market segmentation to create segments (groups) based on a cross-sectional questionnaire measuring individual characteristics and preferences for health information. Educational and delivery recommendations developed for each group.

Setting:

General population of adults in Virginia.

Participants:

Random sample of 1201 Virginia residents. Respondents are representative of the general population with the exception of older age.

Measures:

Multiple factors known to impact health promotion including health status, health system utilization, health literacy, Internet use, learning styles, and preferences.

Analysis:

Cluster analysis and discriminate analysis to create and validate segments. Common sized means to compare factors across segments.

Results:

Developed educational and delivery recommendations matched to the 8 distinct segments. For example, the “health challenged and hard to reach” are older, lower literacy, and not likely to seek out health information. Their educational and delivery recommendations include a sixth-grade reading level, delivery through a provider, and using a “push” strategy.

Conclusion:

This model addresses a need to improve the efficiency and quality of health promotion efforts in an era of personalized medicine. It demonstrates that there are distinct groups with clearly defined educational and delivery recommendations. Health promotion professionals can consider Tailored Educational Approaches for Consumer Health to develop and deliver tailored materials to encourage behavior change.