Care management program evaluation: constituents, conflicts, and moves toward standardization.

Care management program evaluations bring together constituents from finance, medicine, and social sciences. The differing assumptions and scientific philosophies that these constituents bring to the task often lead to frustrations and even contentions. Given the forms and variations of care management programs, the difficulty associated with program outcomes measurement should not be surprising.

The cost of lifestyle health risks: obesity.

Objective: The objective of this study was to provide employers interested in lifestyle health initiatives a resource for estimating their members' obesity-related costs stratified by demographics and business sector.

Method: Claims-level medical costs attributable to obesity are estimated. Data come from 61 U.