Motivators and Barriers to Joining a Lifestyle Change Program for Disease Prevention

Lifestyle change programs (LCPs) are effective in helping people adopt healthy lifestyles and maintain healthy weight for disease prevention. LCPs are known to be underutilized, but the nuances surrounding women's interest in using these programs for disease prevention need to be further explored so that enrollment and retention in these programs can be improved.

The purpose of this study was to explore women's interest in and knowledge of LCPs and identify their motivators and barriers to joining these types of programs through a survey. The survey was administered both online and in person. The survey had 22 questions and included demographics, medical and family history, knowledge and interest in LCPs, and barriers and motivators to participating in LCPs.

Participants in this study included 1,606 women from 40 to 74 years of age. We found that respondents had limited knowledge about the benefits of LCPs in reducing risks of specific diseases, such as breast cancer and osteoarthritis. Respondents reported low-to-moderate interest in LCPs. We found that their interest in these programs was negatively associated with their weekly physical activity and positively associated with their body mass index (BMI) and the number of reported barriers to joining LCPs. The most common barriers cited were cost, location, time, and too many meetings. In addition, we found that respondents who had or were unsure about their family history of diabetes were more interested in LCPs compared with individuals who had no family history of diabetes. We did not find significant differences in respondent interest in LCPs across ethnicity.

Our study suggests that specific barriers to LCPs-including women's knowledge of such programs-will need to be addressed before enrollment and retention in LCPs are increased.