Wellness Programs : Wellness Programs and Ethnic Profiling.
In many segments of society, we hear about racial and ethnic profiling in negative ways. But what about when it comes to wellness programs?
When used for the specific purpose of beginning – or assessing - a wellness or disease management (DM) program, profiling isn’t just legal. It’s also encouraged.
Affects health risks
Different ethnic and racial groups tend to be more at risk – for genetic and/or cultural reasons – of certain health problems. Examples –
• African-American, Latino, Native American and Pacific Islanders are at higher risk of diabetes than Caucasian employees
• Chinese women are statistically twice as likely to get cervical cancer
• Caucasians have disproportionately high rates of obesity and high blood pressure, and
• Latinos have higher rates of asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease than other groups. The HIV/AIDS population is also disproportionately Hispanic.
Bottom line – By assessing the ethnic breakdown of your employee population, you are able to set disease management (DM) program priorities with greater confidence and accuracy.
Healthcare quality an issue
A few studies also show there’s an unfortunate relationship between ethnicity and quality of health care. Many times, minority workers receive inferior treatment and health education at the same facilities where others receive top-notch care.
This typically happens for innocent reasons. A common scenario – a lack of Spanish-speaking physicians in the network for your Latino employees. But the result is typically higher health care costs for you and, often, greater reluctance among minority employees to seek needed treatments.
By profiling staff against the doctors in the network, you ultimately help staff get the care they need and the business to better control long-term costs.
