Surveying managed care members on chronic disease

We compare prevalence estimates of self-perceived health status and chronic disease risk factors from a managed care member survey with estimates from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) survey. Unadjusted prevalence estimates for diabetes, high blood pressure, and current smoking status were similar in the two surveys. In contrast, 5.1 percent of respondents to the managed care member survey reported fair-to-poor health status, compared with 12.4 percent of respondents to the BRFSS survey. Standardization of demographic characteristics reduced the prevalence of reported fair-to-poor health status among BRFSS respondents to 9 percent. We conclude that standardized survey questions added to annual member surveys in managed care organizations are a feasible and potentially useful method of chronic disease surveillance.