Currently over 18 million students are enrolled in USA institutions of higher education (IHEs), representing more than one-third of the young adult population. In a national survey, about 16% of students reported living at home. SHCs are therefore an important resource for the majority of college students. College communities are unique settings that are geographically diverse, highly mobile, and densely populated with congregate living and learning conditions. IHEs, therefore, are highly vulnerable to the introduction of contagious diseases with subsequent transmission to surrounding communities. Thousands of counseling and student health centers exist, funded by billions of dollars. Despite these facts, there was no national database on the health care utilization of this population. In an era in which health policies and plans are typically guided by data, we were relatively blind to information about the diagnoses, epidemiologic trends and health care needs of young adults attending colleges and universities.
Objective
We received CDC funding to create and maintain a multi-institutional de-identified medical records database from student health centers (SHCs) for a nationally representative sample of colleges and universities.