Domestic Health Index - Incite at Columbia University

Completed Project

Domestic Health Index

  • Funding Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
  • Timeframe 2017–2019
  • Funded by Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
  • Project Team Peter Bearman Adam Reich Kathryn Neckerman

The proliferation of wearable technology presents an unprecedented opportunity both to measure population health in new ways and to make it more culturally salient.

We envisioned a “domestic health index,” or DHI, as both a promotional tool and as a valuable dataset in its own right. Between 2017 and 2019, we consulted experts and learned more about the rapidly evolving digital health space.

As part of this exploration, we conducted a scan of the use of wearable devices and mHealth (mobile health) apps in research, with a focus on work that would inform our planning for a DHI. Next, we engaged a series of issues that bear more specifically on the design of a DHI, including what health indicators to include, how participants might be recruited and retained, and—ultimately—how this initiative might be sustained.

In January 2019, we published a draft of the Domestic Health Index.

Related Works

  • open website

    Peter Bearman, Adam Reich, Kathryn Neckerman, "How Wearable Devices Can Promote the Culture of Health", Incite Institute, January 1, 2019

  • open website

    Peter Bearman, Adam Reich, Kathryn Neckerman, "Domestic Health Index", Incite Institute at Columbia University, January 1, 2019

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