Health and wellness program development

This is known as an employee wellness program. It can be hard to see the advantages of an employee wellness program at first glance. But the truth is healthy employees bring an array of benefits to the businesses they work for. Here are a few benefits of having an employee wellness program. Gym membership reimbursements or office yoga classes might come to mind when someone thinks of an employee wellness program.

These are great activities to offer but a quality program can include so much more. Here are some activities and benefits you can offer that cover all areas of employee health.

You can instead reimburse employees for fitness-related purchases or encourage your staff to form after-work exercise groups. Another idea is to use Fitbits or other wearable technology to track the activity of your employees and reward the most active people. Exercise is good for the immune system but there is more you can to do to help your employees fight off illness. During the winter, you can offer flu shots and make it known that employees are to stay home if they have a bug.

Stress is a silent killer that can trigger serious health problems. It also goes hand-in-hand with mental health issues like depression and anxiety. First and foremost, make sure no one is burning the candle on both ends. Wellness Jackpot was founded in as a mere wellness incentive company for employees. Today they offer some of the best incentive programs for employees in the industry.

Employees in more than 11 countries have used wellness programs in the workplace that were created by Wellness Jackpot. They even have an online system where employees can be engaged in bettering their health through interactive educational tools and mobile health trackers. Massage at Work is a unique kind of well-being company that emphasizes the use of massage chairs into their health and wellness programs. Companies hire Massage at Work to install their chairs into the work environment so that employees can use them.

Massage chairs have been found to reduce stress, increase blood circulation, and reduce back and neck pain. With the massage chairs by Massage at Work, companies will save even more money with their investment because these chairs just keep satisfying employees over and over again. HealthForce helps employers build and maintain a healthy workforce. We deliver health information, expert advice and professional services where and when needed.

They provide online management of job-based health questionnaires, physical exams and medical clearances for onboarding, regulatory compliance and return-to-work. Orchestrate from your desktop. Employers can also get staffing and management of worksite health clinics and on-demand delivery of health testing, screening and examination services at the worksite. Founded in , MindBody is a software company that creates business management software which caters specifically to clients of the wellness services industry.

MindBody does not create health and wellness programs or wellness programs in the workplace. Instead, they will provide online business management software to a well-being company that offers these types of services. The software is cloud-based, which means the software data is easily accessible to anyone given privileged access to the account. MindBody currently has roughly 35 million people using their cloud-based software in over countries throughout the world.

Corporate wellness programs in the workplace can be effective if they are management properly. Based in Allouez, Wisconsin, myinertia is a health consultant company which creates wellness management software that can track all the health and wellness programs of a company. Employers will receive a customizable template for the online system which they can structure in a way that is suitable for the wellness programs in the workplace they are using.

Spire introduces wellness programs in the workplace in order to help employees become healthier. Spire will help your employees become more engaged in their healthcare while reducing the healthcare costs you have to pay for them.

Ultimately, Spire will transform your workforce into one that is happier, healthier, and more productive. Spire was founded in Chattanooga, Tennessee by a group of former soccer players. Their idea was to figure out a way to not only bring rewards, motivation, and support to those participating on sports teams, but to also bring these concepts to employees in the workplace as well.

Christina Ford and Martha Switzer created Sprout after working for big multinational corporations for years and seeing their lack of wellness programs in the workplace. Now more employees have the knowledge and resources necessary to live healthy and productive lifestyles. In addition, Sprout gives employers the tools to measure the impact that these health and wellness programs are having on their employees. WellNow helps employers implement wellness programs in the workplace that are based on data-driven insight and strategies towards employee wellness.

WellNow will first offer a health assessment on the employees and then create custom health and wellness programs that are suitable for their particular health issues. WellNow can also provide disease management services in case the organization in question has a disease problem. Stress management is becoming a more crucial resource for companies. If employees are too stressed, it can be detrimental to the productivity of a company. StressStop was created to deliver an array of stress management resources to companies that are currently having this problem with their employees.

Furthermore, StressStop will ensure these stress management resources pertain to the culture and atmosphere of the company that needs them. Step 3: Establish a Wellness Committee After conducting a needs assessment and obtaining management support, an employer can create an internal, employee-driven committee that helps build and sustain a wellness culture in the organization.

The responsibilities of the wellness committee might include the following: Evaluating the current programs, services and policies that are available in the workplace. Assessing employee needs and preferences. Developing a health promotion operating plan, including a vision statement, goals and objectives. Assisting in implementing, monitoring and evaluating wellness activities. Employers may want to address these additional considerations for the wellness committee: Determine in advance how long wellness committee members will serve and how new members will be selected.

Employers may want to alternate committee members annually to avoid burnout and to obtain new perspectives. Select committee members who can best represent their peers, motivate others and support the implementation of the wellness program.

Employers may want to obtain the support of committee members' supervisors in providing each committee member time to devote to the committee activities. Step 4: Develop Goals and Objectives Using the information gathered from the workforce assessment, employers can establish goals and objectives for the program. Below are a few examples of goals and objectives: Reduce the number of employees who smoke by 5 percent in fiscal year 20XX.

Increase the number of employees enrolled in smoking cessation classes by 15 percent by the second quarter of 20XX. Decrease the number of employees identified as obese by 5 percent in 20XX. Increase the level of medication adherence of the employee population by 10 percent. Step 5: Establish a Budget Establishing a budget is a critical step in creating the wellness program.

Additionally, employers may want to consider taking the following steps to look for hidden funding resources: Conduct surveys to determine if employees would be willing to pay for an aspect of the wellness program such as yoga or exercise classes. Partner with the health insurance carrier to determine wellness components offered by the insurance carrier. Often these program costs are already included in the health insurance premiums. Research the option of participating in clinical studies from universities or hospitals studying the impact of workplace wellness programs.

Research free community resources or programs to supplement the wellness program. Consider implementing low- or no-cost internal activities such as a lunch walking group.

Step 6: Design Wellness Program Components Employers have great latitude in designing the wellness program. Examples of common programs are as follows: Stress reduction programs. Weight loss programs. Smoking cessation programs. Health risk assessments. Health screenings.

Exercise programs and activities. Nutrition education. Vaccination clinics. Although employers do have great latitude in designing wellness programs, like with the health risk assessments discussed earlier, employers still need to consider the legal issues and compliance requirements provided by the ADA, GINA, HIPAA and the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act PPACA , such as: The ADA prohibits employers from discriminating against individuals on the basis of disability, including an employee's access to wellness programs.

GINA allows employers to "request, require, or purchase genetic information" in connection with employer-provided health or genetic services only if the services "are reasonably designed to promote health or prevent disease. Programs must be reasonably designed to be available to all similarly situated individuals, and individuals must be given notice of the opportunity to qualify for the same rewards through other means.

Step 7: Select Wellness Program Incentives or Rewards Incentives or rewards are an effective tool to change unhealthy behaviors, to adhere to healthy behaviors, to increase participation rates or to help individuals complete a program.

Step 8: Communicate the Wellness Plan The next step is to write and communicate the organization's wellness policy. This can be done in many ways, using well-established techniques of marketing and changing behavior, such as the following: An attention-generating program rollout. Wellness education based on sound research. Persuasion of employees based on anecdotal situations. Sustaining the message and the program over several years.

Multiple avenues of communication, such as e-mail, fliers and presentations. Repetition of the message. Keeping the message fresh with new information. Step 9: Evaluate the Success of the Program As with any investment or project, evaluating the effectiveness of the wellness program is important in sustaining management and employee support and in revising or implementing new programs.

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