Journal article

Community BMI Surveillance Using an Existing Immunization Registry in San Diego, California.

This

study examines the demographic representativeness of the County of

San Diego Body Mass Index (BMI) Surveillance System to determine if

the BMI estimates being obtained from this convenience sample of

individuals who visited their healthcare provider for outpatient

services can be generalized to the general population of San Diego.

Height and weight were transmitted from electronic health records

systems to the San Diego Immunization Registry (SDIR). Age, gender,

and race/ethnicity of this sample are compared to general

population estimates by sub-regional area (SRA) (n = 41) to account

for regional demographic differences. A < 10% difference

(calculated as the ratio of the differences between the frequencies

of a sub-group in this sample and general population estimates

obtained from the U.S. Census Bureau) was used to determine

representativeness. In 2011, the sample consisted of 352,924

residents aged 2-100 years. The younger age groups (2-11,

12-17 years) and the oldest age group (≥65 years) were

representative in 90, 75, and 85% of SRAs, respectively.

Furthermore, at least one of the five racial/ethnic groups was

represented in 71% of SRAs. This BMI Surveillance System was found

to demographically represent some SRAs well, suggesting that this

registry-based surveillance system may be useful in estimating and

monitoring neighborhood-level BMI data

Authors

Languages

Publication year

2016

Journal

Journal of community health

Type

Journal article