Evaluation of health newsletters as a motivational tool to promote exercise.

摘要

Little is known about the relationship between Sage Plus newsletters and its effectiveness to motivate physical activity. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the impact of the SagePlus newsletter and its ability to motivate participants to achieve their goals to increase physical activity. A nonexperimental, descriptive correlational design was used in this study. Calls were made until the list of potential participants was exhausted. Forty English speaking participants were contacted and agreed to participate in the telephone survey from a potential list of 190 women enrolled in the SagePlus program. A modified questionnaire containing 19 multiple-choice and one open-ended question was used in a telephone survey. Data was analyzed using the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 12. Participants increased their minutes of moderate activity (50%) and minutes of walking (67.5%) from the time of enrollment in the Sage Plus program to the time this study was conducted. The participants reading and receiving the newsletter were motivated to continue to work on their activity/exercise habits and goals, however, an increase in physical activity was found only in minutes of moderate activity and minutes of walking activity. Participants reported improvement in exercise habits (77.5%) and exercise goals (82.5%) from reading the newsletter. Healthcare providers can promote healthy lifestyle changes by the use of newsletters however no correlation existed between reading the SagePlus newsletter and engaging in physical activity.