• Warren J Strauss, Christopher J Sroka, Edward A Frongillo, S Sonia Arteaga, Catherine M Loria, Eric S Leifer, Colin O Wu, Heather Patrick, Howard A Fishbein, and Lisa V John.
• Battelle Health and Analytics, Columbus, Ohio. Electronic address: strauss@battelle.org.
• Am J Prev Med. 2015 Oct 1; 49 (4): 624630624-30.

AbstractThe Healthy Communities Study is designed to assess relationships between characteristics of community programs and policies targeting childhood obesity and children's BMI, diet, and physical activity. The study involved a complex data collection protocol implemented over a 2-year period (2013-2015) across a diverse sample of 130 communities, defined as public high school catchment areas. The protocol involved baseline assessment within each community that included in-person or telephone interviews regarding community programs and policies and in-home collection of BMI, nutritional, and physical activity outcomes from a sample of up to 81 children enrolled in kindergarten through eighth grade in public schools. The protocol also involved medical record reviews to establish a longitudinal trajectory of BMI for an estimated 70% of participating children. Staged sampling was used to collect less detailed measures of physical activity and nutrition across the entire sample of children, with a subset assessed using more costly, burdensome, and detailed measures. Data from the Healthy Community Study will be analyzed using both cross-sectional and longitudinal models that account for the complex design and correct for measurement error and bias using a likelihood-based Markov-chain Monte Carlo methodology. This methods paper provides insights into the complex design features of the Healthy Communities Study and may serve as an example for future large-scale studies that assess the relationship between community-based programs and policies and health outcomes of community residents.Copyright © 2015 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. All rights reserved.

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