Examine participant drop-outs in a chronic disease prevention education program

There were 2768 participants enrolled in the Alliance for a Healthy Border program, a chronic disease prevention program through twelve federally qualified community health centers serving primarily Hispanics in communities along the U.S.-Mexico border. Survey and health measurements were obtained at three time points according to the pre-post-post study design. Successes of the program were evaluated in previous studies based on various outcomes such as weight reduction, glycemic control, and physical activity improvement. In this paper, we illustrate the examination of attrition bias. In addition, we studied potential factors that might contribute to participant dropout. Logistic regression was used to examine the association between participant dropout and nineteen predictors at two time points: end-of-program and post-six-month. Participant dropout was categorized as stay or drop. Predictors include gender, age, marital status, birth country, number of children at home, employment status, education, income, insurance, self-reported health status, baseline HbA1c, baseline BMI, smoking status, drinking status, limitation by problems, session type, program duration in weeks and curriculum. At both the end-of-program and the post-six-month time points, the attrition bias was not significant. We found that the potential predictors for participant dropout at the end of program included age, number of children at home, employment, program duration and curriculum. The potential predictors for participant dropout at a relative longer time (post-six-month) included age, income, insurance, self-reported health status, session type, program duration and curriculum.