Employee Health Promotion

The program design options hinge upon the goals/objectives and desired outcomes
of your program. If your objective is to help employees change behavior, reduce
risk factors, or save health care money then your wellness program would be
designed to accomplish those outcomes and a budget would be crucial to support
that design.

There are different wellness program design levels depending on desired outcomes
and budgets. Each level has pros and cons. The intentions or results are quite
different, are not interchangeable in terms of obtaining similar results, and
therefore ought not be confused. By way of example, planning activities such
as an employee wellness fair or lunchtime education sessions, or having pamphlets
available do not usually result in behavior modification, but may expand awareness
on a topic. If the objective is behavior modification then a different design
is required, such as Lifestyle/Behavior Change Programs and Employer Support.
The outline below outlines the wellness design levels with a short explanation.

Awareness Programs: At this level a organization makes health information available
and accessible to employees. This type of program can include pamphlets on a
variety of subject matters, wellness articles in newsletters, bulletin board
displays, e-mail health messages, etc. Also, most health fairs are designed
as awareness programs with vendors offering information and offering health
screenings to employees.

Awareness programs are cheap and do not require extensive employee or organization
time commitments. However, these programs do not usually yield behavior change.
Growing awareness isn’t usually enough to generate lifestyle changes for
most people, unless used to arouse employees to register for a program being
provided at the organization or neighborhood on the topic. An example of this
would be offering information on the dangerous effects of smoking and inviting
employees who use tobacco to register for a smoking cessation class.

Education Programs: Educational programs often offer more information on a
topic and are able to also provide time for Q & A, but are similar to awareness
programs. An example is lunch-n-learn sessions on a health related topic. These
cost the organization a bit more than awareness programs; however, they are
still inexpensive and do not require much time for planning or attending a session.
Again, building awareness and offering information may not lead to the desired
behavior modification unless ongoing support or rewards and incentives are also
planned.

Lifestyle/Behavior Change Programs: These programs are designed as 4 to 12
weekly sessions or classes to offer health & wellness education, address
barriers and offer opportunities to practice the desired skills. Behavior change
programs therefore require additional organization resources, cost more, and
also require additional employee responsibility, time and effort. The results
are often the desired positive lifestyle change, which if sustained may lead
to potential cost savings.

Examples are smoking cessation classes, weight loss and weight management meetings,
or an ongoing physical activity program.

Environmental and Employer Support: Environmental support is often considered
the highest and most important level to include when beginning your wellness
program in order to support and maintain healthy behaviors. These design options
include policy changes such as:

• Creating a tobacco-free workplace
• Designating a walking path,
• Establishing onsite fitness centers,
• Ensuring healthy vending machines choices,
• Offering healthy meal choices in the cafeteria, and/or
• Establishing flex-time policies.

Other examples include subsidizing healthy vending machines or cafeteria choices;
reimbursing health club or weight loss and weight management program memberships;
or offering insurance rewards and incentives for healthy behaviors.

Ideally, the wellness program design would include some of all of these options.
The more comprehensive the approach, the more successful the outcome will be.
By way of example, a organization can have tobacco cessation information available;
can schedule a one hour awareness session on the harmful effects of smoking
and how to quit; can enable an onsite smoking cessation program, supply self
quit smoking kits, or support employees to attend a neighborhood program; and/or
on an environmental support level can establish a tobacco-free workplace and
grounds, offer decreased health care insurance for non-smokers, or offer pharmacological
quit smoking aids for free.

Employee Health Promotion : Components for Success

There are many important components that must be considered to ensure the effectiveness
of your Employee Health Promotion or Employee Health Promotion . These include:

• Senior Management Support & Employee Involvement
• Active Employee Health Promotion Committee
• Program is Based on Employee Needs & Interests
• Goals and Objectives are Established
• Detailed Action Plan Based upon Resources & Budget
• Program Implementation & Internal Marketing
• Evaluation of Outcomes and Program

Major benefits of healthy employees include:

• Lower Health Care expenses
• Lowered Injuries
• Lowered Absenteeism
• Increased Morale and Loyalty
• Increased Productivity
• Lowered Use of Health Care Benefits
• Lowered Workers’ Comp/Disability
• Positive Image in Community
• Lowered Turnover
• Better recruitment for skilled employees

What is NOT Having a Employee Health Promotion Costing Your Employer?

Consider the health risk factors that are exacerbating chronic diseases
for adults:

• 59% of American adults are overweight or obese
• Greater than 60% of adults do not get regular exercise
• Greater than 75% of adults do not consume the minimum recommendations for
  fruits and vegetables
• Heart disease is the leading common cause of death and the primary cause
  of death in smokers
• 26% of employees stated they were often or very often burned out or stressed
  by their job

Health Care expenses are Increasing: Health Care costs are at a record level
of $1.7 trillion with no signs of holding steady, let alone going down. The
average expense of yearly health care spending is over $5,000 per person and
with dependents almost $10,000. Recent data shows that health care expenses
now cost North Carolina organizations thousands of dollars per employee, per
year.

Most Illnesses Can Be Prevented: Although it sounds unrealistic, experts insist
that preventable illness makes up 60% – 70% of the entire burden of illness
in the U.S.. In North Carolina, it is estimated that more than 53% of all deaths
are preventable, and that 2/3 of all preventable deaths are due to tobacco use,
physical inactivity, and poor nutrition.

Stress Levels are Rising: As organization resources become less and organizations
adopt leaner work practices, the effects of absenteeism and productivity lost
have a more powerful influence. In a current nationwide poll, 78% of American
citizens described their jobs as stressful, and most believe that stress levels
have worsened over The previous decade. To make matters worse, high levels of
organization stress can negatively affect a organization by growing injuries,
absenteeism, and healthcare costs while decreasing work rate. Simple solutions
such as stress management education, flexible work schedules, quality social
interaction, and increased participation in organization decision-making can
improve stress levels in the workplace.

What is the Initial Cost and Time Investment for a Employee Health Promotion
?

The cost depends on the type of Employee Health Promotion implemented. There
are several options to reward employee health with pros and cons of each. The
program design depends on the goals/objectives of the wellness program, the
organization resources, and the neighborhood resources available.

Enhancing dietary practices, building physical exercise levels, managing stress
or addressing work life balance problems, and decreasing/eliminating tobacco
use, are primary strategies for preventing many of the most common preventable
chronic diseases. The possibilities of how your organization addresses these
problems are endless and can range from building employee awareness, which may
include purchasing a few pamphlets on a variety of topics, and quantifying walking
distances around your facility, to implementing organization support such as
funding a full-time occupational health consultant or building an onsite fitness
center.

When well-planned and based on your goals/objectives, any of these programs
can help you succeed. Refer below to Employee Health Promotion Design Options
for additional ideas.