Development of a Consumer Research Network for Studying Obesity

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DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Consumer Research Network to Facilitate Research in the Science of Health: The primary goal of this proposal is to develop and implement an innovative consumer research network (CRN) that can advance the research in the science of improving health by creating a consumer based health information technology (HIT) infrastructure that allows investigators to connect directly with individual consumers to participate in research. This proposed CRN infrastructure will leverage an extensive network of secure web based personal health records (PHRs) through an alliance of employers of the Buyers Health Care Action Group who are implementing Personal Health Records (PHRs) to cover more than 600,000 employees and dependents. The PHRs will be populated with medical records through the Minnesota Health Information Exchange include health data for over 90% of the Minnesota population. This ground breaking effort will be the first of its kind in the United States to use a consumer based HIT network to improve research capabilities by increasing access to large diverse populations to power large epidemiological and genetic studies. It can also reduce the cost of clinical, epigenetic, and public health research as well as support consumer centric health care delivery. The study has two specific aims: 1) Develop the informatics infrastructure for the Consumer Research Network by linking the network of personal health records; 2) Conduct a comparative effective study of consumer based strategies for weight management and obesity prevention in the consenting consumer population who are in the CRN. PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: The primary goal of this proposal is to develop and implement an innovative consumer research network (CRN) that can advance the research in the science of improving health by creating a consumer based health information technology (HIT) infrastructure that allows investigators to connect directly with individual consumers to participate in research. The CRN infrastructure will leverage an extensive network of secure web based personal health records (PHRs) through an alliance of national employers of the Buyers Health Care Action Group who are implementing Personal Health Records (PHRs) to cover more than 600,000 employees and dependents. In this study, the infrastructure will be developed and the utility of it to conduct research will be used with consumers in a study of comparative effectiveness of consumer strategies for weight management and obesity prevention. This ground breaking effort will be the first of its kind in the United States to use a consumer based HIT network to improve research capabilities by increasing access to large diverse populations to power large epidemiological and genetic studies. It can also reduce the cost of clinical, epigenetic, and public health research as well as support consumer centric health care delivery.