Corporate Wellness Programs

Small and large organizations carry a significant proportion of the provision of health care for families in this country by providing medical insurance for their staff members. With the escalating increase in medical cost many organizations are attempting to slow the increase of medical insurance premiums by providing creative cost control initiatives. Greater emphasis is being put on primary prevention to keep staff members healthy and secondary prevention to identify and treat health conditions before they can become serious.

At some workplaces, staff members are being encouraged to take greater responsibility for their health related behaviors through risk rated incentive packages. Linking wellness to worker benefits of gain sharing and co-payment cost reductions will provide new opportunities requiring efforts of collaboration between the human resource managers and the Corporate Wellness Program specialists. These two sets of professionals may also work together for the ongoing evaluation of cost effective Corporate Wellness Programs.

In conjunction with the above initiatives most large organizations also have a nurse or physician on staff to dispense on-site medical and preventive care. Some initiatives have also found it cost effective to provide their own physical therapy programming to assist injured and infirm workers in regaining optimal functioning. A comprehensive selection of health related worker services and benefits would include the following:

• Free or low cost health screenings provided on site by corporation clinical personnel or through outside contractors:

• • • Serum cholesterol
    • Colorectal cancer screen
    • Blood pressure screening
    • Mammography
    • Vision and hearing testing
    • Diabetes

• Referral and follow-up procedures (e.g., Hypertension, Cholesterol, Cancer)
• First Aid and emergency care
• Disease control and prevention initiatives
• Child and infirm adult care services
• Financial and Pre-Retirement planning
• Continued learning/educational opportunities
• Coordination of corporation picnics and outings
• Parent-child work visitation initiatives
• Workers compensation/rehabilitation