Testing an Additional Mailing Piece in the American Community Survey

Testing an Additional Mailing in the American Community Survey

Predictors of Language Service Availability in U.S. Hospitals

Background Hispanics comprise 17% of the total U.S. population, surpassing African-Americans as the largest minority group. Linguistically, almost 60 million people speak a language other than English. This language diversity can create barriers and additional burden and risk when seeking health services. Patients with Limited English Proficiency (LEP) for example, have been shown to experience...

Financial Incentives: Only One Piece of the Workplace Wellness Puzzle; Comment on “Corporate Wellness Programs: Implementation Challenges in the Modern American Workplace”

In this commentary, we argue that financial incentives are only one of many key components that employers should consider when designing and implementing a workplace wellness program. Strategies such as social encouragement and providing token rewards may also be effective in improving awareness and engagement. Should employers choose to utilize financial incentives, they should tailor them to ...

Protective Effects of Educational Attainment Against Cigarette Smoking; Diminished Returns of American Indians and Alaska Natives in the National Health Interview Survey

Introduction: Although educational attainment is protective against health risk behaviors such as smoking, the Minorities’ Diminished Return theory posits that these protective effects are smaller for ethnic minorities than majority groups. This study compared the effects of educational attainment on the smoking status of American Indian/Alaska Native (AIAN) and White ...

Increasing response to mailed questionnaires by including a pencil/pen.

Nonmonetary incentives lead to small increases in response rates to mailed questionnaires. However, inclusion of a pen or pencil, which may be a facilitating factor as well as a reward, has not been shown to improve response to health surveys in prior trials. In 2001 and 2002, the authors conducted two US trials in which a study-logo pen or pencil was randomly included in a second questionnaire...