Wellness Coaching for People With Prediabetes: A Randomized Encouragement Trial to Evaluate Outreach Methods at Kaiser Permanente, Northern California, 2013

INTRODUCTION: Health coaching can improve lifestyle behaviors known to prevent or manage chronic conditions. Little is known about effective ways to encourage health and wellness coaching among people who might benefit. The purpose of this randomized encouragement trial was to assess the relative success of 3 outreach methods (secured email message, telephone message, and mailed letter) on the use of wellness coaching by people with prediabetes. METHODS: A total of 14,584 Kaiser Permanente Northern California (KPNC) patients with diagnosed prediabetes (fasting plasma glucose, 110–125mg/dL) were randomly assigned to be contacted via 1 of 4 intervention arms from January through May 2013. The uptake rate (making an appointment at the Wellness Coaching Center [WCC]) was assessed, and the association between uptake rate and patient characteristics was examined via multivariable logistic regression. RESULTS: The overall uptake rate across intervention arms was 1.9%. Secured email message had the highest uptake rate (3.0%), followed by letters and telephone messages (P < .05 for all pairwise comparisons). No participants in the usual-care arm (ie, no outreach) made an appointment with the WCC. For each year of increased age, the estimated odds of the uptake increased by 1.02 (odds ratio [OR] = 1.02; 95% CI, 1.01–1.04). Women were nearly twice as likely to make an appointment at the WCC as men (OR = 1.87; 95% CI, 1.40–2.51). CONCLUSION: Our results suggest that the WCC can recruit and encourage KPNC members with prediabetes to participate in the WCC. Future research should focus on increasing participation rates in health coaching among patients who may benefit.