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. 2022 Jan 29:26:101716.
doi: 10.1016/j.pmedr.2022.101716. eCollection 2022 Apr.

Modeling the impact of a health coaching intervention to prevent teen pregnancy

Chi-Son Kim  1 , Aletha Akers  2 , Daenuka Muraleetharan  3 , Ava Skolnik  4 , Whitney Garney  3 , Kelly Wilson  3 , Aditi Sameer Rao  5 , Yan Li  6   7
Affiliations

Modeling the impact of a health coaching intervention to prevent teen pregnancy

Chi-Son Kim et al. Prev Med Rep. .

Abstract

Teenage pregnancy is an important public health issue in the United States, presenting significant health and economic risks to adolescents and the society. Health coaching is a potentially effective intervention in preventing teen pregnancy. In 2017, the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia implemented a health coaching program among sexually active teenage girls, which improved their contraceptive continuation rates. However, the cost-effectiveness of the health coaching program is not clear. We developed a microsimulation model of teen pregnancy that can predict the number of teen pregnancies and related birth outcomes. Model parameters were estimated from the literature and the health coaching program. The teen pregnancy model was used to assess how the program could influence direct health care costs and pregnancy outcomes. Our model projected that the health coaching program could prevent 15 teen pregnancies per 1000 adolescents compared to no intervention. The incremental cost-effectiveness ratio (ICER) for the intervention was $309 per pregnancy prevented, which was less than the willingness-to-pay threshold of $4,206 per pregnancy. Thus, the health coaching intervention was cost-effective. Our study provides promising data on the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of a health coaching intervention to reduce the burden of teen pregnancies. Health practitioners should consider implementing the program for a longer term and at a larger scale.

Keywords: Community health; Economic evaluation; Health coaching; Teen pregnancy.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Structure of the teen pregnancy model.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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