ActiveHealth Management to Deliver Innovative NuVal™ Nutritional Scoring System Through Health Website

BRAINTREE, Mass. and NEW YORK, Dec. 7, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- The NuVal™ Nutritional Scoring System, and ActiveHealth Management (ActiveHealth®), a provider of evidence-based health information technology solutions and health management services, announced a contract to bring new tools online to help ActiveHealth members make healthy eating choices.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20100119/NE39897LOGO )

Beginning in December, NuVal's nutrition database of tens of thousands of scored foods will be available to the more than 10 million people who have access to ActiveHealth's personal health website, MyActiveHealth(SM). They will be the first consumers in the country to be able to search NuVal's database based on product name, nutrition attributes, and NuVal Score. NuVal scores rank the nutritional value of foods on a scale from 1 to 100 -- the higher the score, the higher the nutrition. Consumers can compare scores within a food category, such as cereals, or across categories, such as beef burgers to veggie burgers.

Additional tools will enable ActiveHealth members to create personalized shopping lists and meal plans. ActiveHealth disease management and wellness coaches will also have access to the database as a tool for reinforcing better eating habits.

"NuVal scores and the science behind them are an important tool in preventive healthcare," said NuVal LLC General Manager Mike Nugent. "Our collaboration with ActiveHealth will expand access to our nutritional scoring system beyond supermarkets to an online audience. This will give MyActiveHealth users a great new tool, and marks a new industry for NuVal."

"ActiveHealth works continuously to provide access to information and resources to help our members live healthier lives," said Greg Steinberg, MD, President and CEO of ActiveHealth. "A key part of that mission is empowering people to make better decisions. NuVal's scoring system is scientifically robust, yet very easy to use and understand. It arms our members with nutritional knowledge they can use to make better choices every day."

NuVal takes more than 30 different nutrients and nutrition factors into account when developing a Score. This complex process ends in a very simple and easy-to-understand result: a single NuVal score for each food. In addition to the collaboration with ActiveHealth, NuVal is currently available in more than 900 supermarkets across the country.

For more information, please visit www.activehealth.net or www.NuVal.com.

About NuVal:

The NuVal Nutritional Scoring System is a unique food labeling system which ranks all foods between 1 and 100; the higher the score, the higher the food's overall nutrition. NuVal Scores can be found in participating grocery stores, where they are posted on shelf tags next to the product price and on in-store signage. Currently, NuVal scores can be found at Price Chopper, Hy-Vee, Meijer, Brookshire's, Big Y, Skogen's Festival Foods, Food City, Coborn's, and United Supermarket stores, with more U.S. retail chains scheduled to introduce the system to their customers in 2010. Visitors to the NuVal website (www.nuval.com) can find sample scores in a variety of categories. NuVal is a joint venture formed in 2008 by Topco Associates, LLC, and Griffin Hospital. Retailers interested in learning more about the NuVal System can contact NuVal LLC at [email protected] or (781) 228-5800.

About ActiveHealth Management

ActiveHealth Management creates evidence-based health information technology solutions that deliver proven benefits in quality and costs. The company's patented CareEngine® System is developed by physicians and provides tailored and actionable clinical analytics and decision support to help improve patient health and wellness. ActiveHealth's full portfolio of solutions helps payors, providers, patients and other health care organizations collaborate to improve the care experience, reduce costs and save lives. More than 19 million people nationwide benefit from ActiveHealth programs. Founded in 1998 and headquartered in New York City, ActiveHealth is an independent subsidiary of Aetna (NYSE: AET). For more information, please visit http://www.activehealth.net.

SOURCE NuVal