Associations Among Positive Child Health Measures in the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Cohort

Purpose: Effective measurement of positive child health is critical in improving public health. A proposed measure of positive health, a positive child health index (PCHI), is based on how many of 11 specific physical, developmental, and mental health conditions a child has (ranging from 0 to 11). Accepted measures of positive health, Patient-Reported Outcome Measurement Information System (PROMIS®) measures of global health, meaning and purpose, and life satisfaction, are based on child and caregiver perceptions.

Methods: The sample comprised 3713 children aged 5 to 17 years from the NIH Environmental influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) Cohort with data to calculate PCHI and at least 1 child- or caregiver-reported PROMIS measure. Linear regressions were performed to test the associations between each PROMIS measure T-score and the PCHI, adjusting for gestational age, child sex, child age, and maternal factors (age, education, income).

Results: The PROMIS measure associated most strongly with PCHI was caregiver-reported global health, followed by child-reported global health. Caregiver-reported life satisfaction and child-reported meaning and purpose were higher for children with a PCHI = 0 compared with children with 3 or more health conditions but not when compared with children with only 1 or 2 conditions. Among children with 4 or more conditions, girls reported lower global health than boys. Sex differences were not found for caregiver-reported measures.

Conclusion: PROMIS measures and PCHI offer complementary information on positive child health. PROMIS measures are intended as measures of a person's perception of their health, whereas PCHI reflects a cumulative impact of chronic health conditions from the perspective of health care systems. Both viewpoints are informative in public health promotion.

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