Heart check lite: modifications to an established worksite heart health assessment

Develop and test a reduced-item version of an established tool to measure employer supports for cardiovascular health.

A random set of 1000 worksites throughout New York State was surveyed in 1999 with Heart Check, a 226-item assessment of employer supports for cardiovascular health. Correlation, Guttman, factor, and ordinary least squares (OLS) regression analyses were used to identify reduced-item versions. The reduced-item versions were then assessed for their abilities to similarly rank and detect changes in 255 different worksites participating in an intervention program. Regression, correlation, and kappa analyses were used.

Analysis of the Heart Check instrument identified two brief versions with 27 and 55 items. OLS regression of full Heart Check scores for these versions had adjusted R2 of .95 and .97, respectively.

Both reduced-item versions demonstrated a moderate to strong ability to reproduce the results observed with the full Heart Check.