Company Wellness Programs

Who needs wellness programs? If you work in an office or a jobsite or are a member of an organization who spends a considerable amount of time at work, you will definitely benefit from a well-designed corporate wellness program. Employees spend a minimum of about 200 hours a month at work – a considerable amount of time.

Furthermore, distractions, stress, and the pressures of the job itself can take its toll on the worker, which makes it important that a wellness program is implemented. Today, all across America, Canada, Europe and Asia, top corporate wellness programs are being used to help improve employee conditions at work and reduce the cost of worker healthcare.

Some of the top wellness programs currently in use today include:

1. Health Risk Assessments or HRAs

Health Risk Assessment is a top corporate wellness program currently in use globally. Organizations that implement it determine the safety and health concerns of workers by assessing the appropriateness of the facilities and equipment against the needs of the employees.

It can, for example, guide the organization into determining how much air quality within an office room affects the users and then help the assessment team to come up with the measures necessary to correct the problem. An HRA can also evaluate the level of exposure workers have to certain hazardous or dangerous materials and practices.

2. Immunizations

This isn’t always practiced in every country since there are regions where government sponsored immunization shots are available. However, it has also become an important component of the top worker wellness programs in many organizations in North America.

Immunization shots, such as those used to combat flu, for example, are offered to workers for free.

3. Employee Assistance Programs or EAPs

Employee Assistance Programs consist of a wide variety of services. It can range from providing educational resources to employees regarding health issues to sponsoring health services and medical care. In many companies, medical and insurance have also become a staple part of their benefits system.

4. In-house diet and nutrition drives

This is another wellness program that organizations use, particularly those that offer in-house commissary or cafeteria services. Instead of serving richer, high-calorie fare, cafeterias offer options for a healthier diet, usually in the form of low-calorie foods and sugar substitutes.

5. In-house wellness newsletter and campaign drives

One of the top wellness programs that organizations can implement is a self-powered tool using a newsletter to promote wellness, coupled with a visible campaign. The campaign may be done periodically and focus on a specific topic, such as smoking hazards, cancer, stress, carpal tunnel syndrome, safety in the workplace, etc.

The newsletter in itself can be an effective means to deliver information to employees or members of an organization but it is far from perfect. Some employees, for example, may not read the newsletter entirely or even pay attention to it. If the issues outlined in the newsletter are promoted through an active and highly visible campaign, it will be easier to maximize positive results.

6. Exercise and physical activity drives

Another top wellness program for organizations is one that involves physical activities. Companies often sponsor exercise-related events such as marathons and company sports programs to encourage employees to remain fit or lose excess weight. In mid- to large-sized organizations, companies may even pay for gym memberships or in-house exercise facilities.

7. Incentive rewards

Some of the top wellness programs implemented by companies involve incentive rewards. This involves company-sponsored programs that reward employees for achieving specific wellness goals. Participation in health campaigns and signing up for wellness programs are two of the most commonly rewarded schemes. Rewards can range from special recognitions to points (for bigger rewards) to specific gifts. In a few cases, cash may also be used.

However, incentive systems have had mixed reactions and levels of success. But it continues to be one of the top choices among companies who are willing to modify it in order to fit their unique needs.

8. Peer Pressure

In many organizations, companies take advantage of peer pressure in order to encourage workers to participate in wellness programs. This is currently one of the favorite worker wellness programs currently in use today and growing in popularity. Peer pressure is often leveraged to help promote competitions referring to workplace wellness and to persuade employees to be active in company-sponsored health fairs.

As the broader conceptions of health and wellness have evolved, so too have the typologies of interventions offered by organizations. An early typology offered by several researchers proposed three levels of health programs:

Level I: Awareness programs, including newsletters, health fairs, screening sessions, education classes, and other activities that raise individual awareness of the consequences of unhealthy behaviors

Level II: Specific programs for lifestyle modification, including fitness programs, back exercises, and the like, characterized by active employee involvement in adopting health-promoting behaviors

Level III: Programs that create environments in which individuals can sustain healthy lifestyles over the long term, including the provision of fitness centers at the workplace, making healthy food available, and removing unhealthy food from the workplace.

From these three levels, fourth-generation programs evolved, variously referred to as total health programs, comprehensive health promotion programs, or health and productivity management programs. Johnson & Johnson’s Live for Life program represents one of the earliest comprehensive wellness programs. Three key components of the J&J program are health risk assessment, creative educational units, and physical fitness training. Health risk assessments may include analyzes of stress management, fitness, nutrition, safety, and ergonomics, and the assessments are used to identify the individual’s strengths and weaknesses. In the educational units, a wide variety of media is used to deliver education on such topics as weight management, smoking cessation, women’s health issues, and blood pressure management, among other health-related subjects. In J&J’s physical fitness training, programs are tailored specifically to individual needs. Evaluations of the Live for Life program have indicated positive effects on exercise, health behaviors, and employee work attitudes.

Kimberly-Clark Corporation’s Health Management program is also a benchmark comprehensive program, initiated in 1977. The program reflects the company’s culture and its belief that well-informed, healthy employees are happier, safer, more productive, and have better attendance records, and that these factors produce lower health care costs for the organization. Integrated, multidisciplinary teams provide health screening, primary care, exercise programs, nursing care, and employee assistance programs at Kimberly-Clark’s various locations. Fitness facilities include indoor running tracks, Olympic-size pools, nature trails, weights, and aerobic equipment. Preventive and educational services are provided, which include family wellness, nutrition education, CPR training, and sport-specific workshops, among other programs.

Health and productivity management programs (HPM) have three basic goals: (1) to provide integrative services that promote employee health or assist with injury, illness, or work-life balance, (2) to increase productivity and morale, and (3) to manage medical benefits, risk management, employee assistance programs, and other services such that they promote health and productivity. Keys to the success of HPM programs include health promotion and wellness staff who serve as models of healthy lifestyles, employee empowerment, and self-responsibility. The distinguishing factor of HPM programs is the tie to the mission of the business and articulation of the links between individual health and business operations.

In the contemporary workplace human resources are highly valued. Employers understand, employees make or break the success of a company and therefore seek to ensure employees are able to maintain a consistent level of productivity. The health and well-being of employees is important to the modern employer. Wellness programs are becoming commonplace within working environments.

Wellness programs are implemented by a third party company that takes care of the health and well-being of employees within the company. Employee wellness programs vary from health screening and nutritional advice to fitness programs and education.

Companies employ these third party agencies to try to offset the cost of rising medical cover for their employees. Wellness programs are designed to ensure the physical well being of employees is being looked after however these kinds of programs have benefits for both the employer and the employee. Employer benefits include a reduction in sickness related absenteeism and a reduction in the time employees take off in general. Other benefits for the company are reduced medical cover costs and a more educated and healthy work force. Ensuring the health of employees within a company is highly contusive to a happy and productive work place.

Employee wellness programs also have a lot of benefits for employees. Wellness programs often involve some form of education. From smoking cessation programs to weight loss to biometric testing and diabetes screening these programs at the very least raise awareness around important health issues. This awareness can have a drastic effect on employee health and lifestyle. Employee wellness programs aim to improve family health in order to improve the overall wellness of the individual employee.

The basic idea behind employee wellness programs is to align the needs of the company with those of the individual in order to implement a more cost effective solution to health care. The programs education focuses on reducing the need for health care in the future by preventing health problems through education and training. This benefits both the employer and the employee as while the company reduces its outlay in medical cover the employee reaps the benefits of these programs.

While there has been no hard numerical evidence as to the value of employee wellness programs the qualitative substantiation is very apparent. Workplace wellness programs increase the productivity of the employee as well as contributing to their overall lifestyle. A happy and health workplace has proven to be a productive and effective one.Charles Christian is a freelance writer specializing in a variety of industries.

Wellness and fitness programs typically focus on the promotion of positive health and/or the prevention and resolution of health risks. Inherent in these themes are the perspectives of health as the presence of positive states or health as the absence of illness. Both psychology and medicine have historically focused primarily on preventing health risks and healing disease and illness, and consequently, early wellness and fitness interventions followed within this tradition. Recent calls have been made, in contrast, for a focus on health defined as the presence of the positive in both mind and body. The positive psychology movement, pioneered by Martin Seligman and colleagues, emphasizes psychology as a science of human strengths, some of which lead to flourishing and others that act as buffers against illness.

Reflecting this movement toward a more positive view of both physical and mental health, wellness and fitness programs are increasingly including components that promote resilience and positive health as well as the management and identification of health risk factors. Thus the content of these programs includes both health-enhancing activities as well as health risk management activities that encompass health in its broadest definition. Among the goods that are essential to positive human health are having a purpose in life, quality connections to others, and positive self-regard. Aristotle long ago proposed that the highest of all human goods was the realization of the individual’s true potential, which he described as eudaemonia. Wellness and fitness programs thus belong squarely within the realm of career development, as the career facilitates all of these goods. Development of these goods requires the effort of both individuals and organizations.

In addition, the emphasis on health has grown to include not only individual health but also organizational health, as articulated in the preceding section. Healthy organizations consider multiple levels of health (individual, group, and organization). They promote organizational congruence, or fitness, between the organization and its external environment, and between components within the organization.

In summary, a broader, more positive view of health has evolved. This comprehensive view emphasizes positive health, along with health-risk management, and encompasses both healthy individuals and healthy organizations.

I often include meditation in wellness programs and people ask me why? Well quite simply put, it is a much under rated and very important part of every person. Daily meditation has far reaching benefits that will assist most any type of healing modality and approach and in many cases; meditation on its own is very soothing and healing.

WHAT IS MEDITATION

An ordinary person may consider meditation as a worship or prayer. But it is not so. Meditation means awareness. Whatever you do with awareness is meditation. “Watching your breath” is meditation; listening to the birds is meditation. As long as these activities are free from any other distraction to the mind, it is effective meditation.

Meditation is not a technique but a way of life. Meditation means ‘to join together or to yoke’. It describes a state of consciousness, when the mind is free of scattered thoughts and various patterns. The observer (one who is doing meditation) realizes that all the activity of the mind is reduced to one.

A Tibetan Lama was being monitored on a brain scan machine by a scientist wishing to test physiological functions during deep meditation. The scientist said – “Very good Sir. The machine shows that you are able to go very deep in brain relaxation, and that validates your meditation”. “No”, said the Lama, “This (pointing to his brain) validates the machine!”
These days it is commonly understood to mean some form of spiritual practice where one sits down with eyes closed and empties the mind to attain inner peace, relaxation or even an experience of God. Some people use the term as “my gardening is my meditation” or for jogging or art or music, hence creating confusion or misunderstanding.

The word meditation is derived from two Latin words: meditari (to think, to dwell upon, and to exercise the mind) and mederi (to heal). Its Sanskrit derivation ‘medha’ means wisdom.
Many years ago meditation was considered something just not meant for modern people, but now it has become very popular with all types of people. Published scientific and medical evidence has proved its benefits, but it still needs to be much understood.

Traditionally, the classical yoga texts, describe that to attain true states of meditation one must go through several stages. After the necessary preparation of personal and social code, physical position, breath control, and relaxation come the more advanced stages of concentration, contemplation, and then ultimately absorption. But that does not mean that one must perfect any one stage before moving onto the next. The Integral yoga approach is simultaneous application of a little of all stages together.

Commonly today, people can mean any one of these stages when they refer to the term meditation. Some schools only teach concentration techniques, some relaxation, and others teach free form contemplative activities like just sitting and awaiting absorption. Some call it meditation without giving credence to yoga for fear of being branded ‘eastern’. But yoga is not something eastern or western as it is universal in its approach and application.
With regular practice of a balanced series of techniques, the energy of the body and mind can be liberated and the quality of consciousness can be expanded. This is not a subjective claim but is now being investigated by the scientists and being shown by an empirical fact.

HEALTH BENEFITS OF MEDITATION

Though meditation is usually recognized as a largely spiritual practice, it also has many health benefits. The yoga and meditation techniques are being implemented in management of life threatening diseases; in transformation of molecular and genetic structure; in reversal of mental illnesses, in accelerated learning programs, in perceptions and communications beyond the physical, in solving problems and atomic and nuclear physics; in gaining better ecological understanding; in management of lifestyle and future world problems. Some benefits of meditation are:

• It lowers oxygen consumption.

• It decreases respiratory rate.

• It increases blood flow and slows the heart rate.

• Increases exercise tolerance in heart patients.

• Leads to a deeper level of relaxation.

• Good for people with high blood pressure as it brings the B.P. to normal.

• Reduces anxiety attacks by lowering the levels of blood lactate.

• Decreases muscle tension (any pain due to tension) and headaches.

• Builds self-confidence.

• It increases serotonin production which influences mood and behaviour.

• Low levels of serotonin are associated with depression, obesity, insomnia and headaches.

• Helps in chronic diseases like allergies , arthritis etc.

• Reduces Pre- menstrual Syndrome.

• Helps in post-operative healing.

• Enhances the immune system. Research has revealed that meditation increases activity of ‘natural-killer cells’, which kill bacteria and cancer cells.

Also reduces activity of viruses and emotional distress.

Benefits of meditation on Women’s health and Pregnancy:

Identity of your own – besides daughter, wife, mother etc.-

Women begin life as someone’s daughter, and then someone’s lover, wife, someone’s mother. Yes, but who am I- who am I really? Not only does a woman need an understanding of her body but also needs to connect with the essence of her true self. A true self, which is an identity beyond everyday change- beyond gender, beyond fluctuations of hormones, beyond family expectations and other superimposed personality patterns. Discovering this true self is not as easy. Just when you know who you are, it all changes again.

The process of self discovery involves, stripping off false layers of identity, going back through all the conditionings, realizing- “I am not that, and not that, and not that”, an emptiness out of which arises the realization – “Ah ha! I am that”.
The place for this self discovery is not the psychiatrist’s couch, the matrimonial bed, the mother’s group, or even a yoga retreat, but within your own private meditation times.

Resolve Phobias

Meditation can help to resolve the deepest of neuroses, fears and conflict which play their part in causing stress and ill health.

For mothers-to-be

Meditation puts mothers in tune with their babies. Manta Japa is especially appropriate for pregnant women. After birth, daily meditation becomes a precious time to refocus and make sense of the many new thoughts and feelings which can be running through your mind, brought about by the events of childbirth and new motherhood.
Now you can see why I am an advocate of meditation.
Have a great day!

Craig Hitchens. B.HSc.

Thousands of men and women all over the world have reduced their chance of getting stress-related diseases through wellness programs and general health and wellness. Corporations in the Western world have been recently implementing voluntary wellness programs in order to create healthier happier employees. This may mean providing facilities where employees can practice their fitness regimes as well as providing wellness tips through trained professionals and tailoring routines for all of the individual employees. The benefits of reducing the stress in our every day lives is endless.

Health and wellness is so important because it affects all aspects of our lives. Information is available through the Internet, media, and of course the references of our friends and family. Wellness programs suggest we use whole food supplements, Chinese herbs and the ayurvedic medicine of India. Wellness tips are a great way to start experimenting on what best works for you. This is a free guide to all alternative healing products and information so you can find exactly what you are searching for.

We provide a guide that allows you to find many qualified alternative healing providers as well as an abundance of wellness tips. You will be able to create wellness programs that are specially customized for you and your entire family. Remember, balance, health and wellness can drastically improve all areas of your life. Imagine living completely pain free and stress free, the possibility is there and available to you.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gregg_Makarowski

When an employee is sick or injured, many times it has a direct affect on an employer’s cost of health care, disability, worker’s compensation, increased absenteeism, lower productivity, reduced safety and morale.The object of an employee incentive wellness program is to improve the health of a company’s workers and to improve its productivity. This type of program helps ensure consistency with an employer’s long-term strategy on health care management. It aids in forming the framework for effective wellness, health improvement and care management programs.

Wellness incentive programs need close coordination by a company’s human resource department; otherwise these programs are less effective. If there is no coordination or follow-up, it is difficult to measure outcomes and performance. The best incentive programs work on a collaborative approach between the health management company and the employer. The goal is to find cost-effective solutions to meet budget needs and reinforce them by performance-based service guarantees. The bottom line is the employer wants to see reduced health care spending and show a return on the health management investment, as well as improvement in the health of employees.

Investing in a corporate workplace wellness program is a good way to improve overall employee morale as well as reduce employee turnover and overall health care costs. By initiating a workplace wellness program in your organization you create a positive, energetic and productive workplace that provides meaningful gains for your business.

Components of a wellness incentive program include preventive health screenings, health fairs, health risk assessments, wellness programs (weight reduction and exercise), Education, newsletters, employee wellness surveys, incentive strategies and employee communications.