Health Handouts : What are Workplace Health Promotion Programs?

The President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports specifies wellness as “a multidimensional state of being describing the existence of positive health in an individual as exemplified by quality of life and a sense of well-being.” Wellness looks beyond the current guide of treating disease and focuses on preventive conduct and healthier lifestyles. Worksite Wellness Programs, also frequently referred to as Worksite Wellness Programs, serve as a complement to existing insurance-based health benefit programs and can take many forms and address a myriad different potential health conditions. They are a powerful strategy to promote positive lifestyle changes that can result in significant cost savings for corporations.

Examples of potential components of a Company Health Promotion Program include:

Health Risk Assessments / Employee Wellness Screenings – Health Risk Assessments (aka Health Risk Appraisals), evaluate the most prevalent lifestyle-related risks of an individual. HRAs often comprise of screenings for Blood Pressure, cholesterol, glucose levels and other health indicators. These analyses support important benchmarking measures that ideally will allow employees to prevent or reduce their risk of illnesses. Finding Wealth Through Wellness, As noted by Kathryn Krivy, director of Northwestern Memorial Hospital’s Wellness Institute in Chicago, “Medically based Health Risk Assessments are a necessity because in order to affect modifications in your employer, you need to know what the problems are, and you just don’t know until you get the data.”

Physical Activity and Weight Management – One of the most popular Company Health Promotion Programs is for employers to provide access to a fitness center, frequently onsite. Other potential measures include offering healthier vending machines and cafeteria options, weight management support groups and fitness challenge programs. Some employers, like hospital group Baptist Health South Florida, will even pay for employees to frequent weight-loss seminars such as Weight Watchers.

Awareness and Education Programs – A lot  businesses have events addressing the benefits of nutrition, safety or physical fitness, among other subject matters. Other options are to host a health fair or administer a disease-awareness campaign.

Behavior Modification – This covers issues like smoking, wearing seat belts, and alcohol use. While many organizations will supply assistance for workers looking to change behavior, some organizations, like healthcare benefits administrator Weyco, Inc., mandate transformation, such as stopping smoking, as a condition of employment.

Alternative Treatments – Other Worksite Health Promotion Programs can include absorbing some or all of the costs for massages, stress-reduction activities like yoga or even herbal medicines.