A TAXONOMY OF ADOLESCENT HEALTH - DEVELOPMENT OF THE ADOLESCENT HEALTH PROFILE-TYPES

OBJECTIVES. The aim of this study was to develop a taxonomy of health profile-types that describe adolescents' patterns of health as self-re ported on a health status questionnaire. The intent was to be able to assign individuals to mutually exclusive and exhaustive groups that ch aracterize the important aspects of their health and need for health s ervices. METHODS. Cluster analytic empirical methods and clinically ba sed conceptual methods were used to identify patterns of health in sam ples of adolescents from schools and from clinics that serve adolescen ts with chronic conditions and acute illnesses. Individuals with simil ar patterns of scores across multiple domains were assigned to the sam e profile-type. Results from the empirical and conceptually based meth ods were integrated to produce a practical system for assigning youths to profile-types. RESULTS. Four domains of health (Satisfaction, Disc omfort, Risks and Resilience) were used to group individuals into 13 d istinct profile-types. The profile-types were characterized primarily by the number of domains in which health is poor, identifying the uniq ue combinations of problems that characterize different subgroups ol: adolescents. CONCLUSIONS. This method of reporting the information ava ilable on health status surveys is potentially a more informative way of identifying and classifying the health needs of subgroups in the po pulation than is available from global scores or multiple scale scores . The reliability and validity of this taxonomy of health profile-type s for the purposes of planning and evaluating health services must be demonstrated. That is the purpose of the accompanying study.