|
Benefits Business Wellness programs seem to pay off Both employers and employees report benefits of such programs By Len Strazewski
A healthy employee is a happy employee, and a happy and healthy employee keeps productivity high and health care costs low. For more than 20 years, that philosophy has motivated some employers to pay for employee wellness and work/life programs, even when quantitative measurement couldn’t prove a documented return on investment, But those days are over, says Craig Hasday, president of Frenkel Benefits LLC, the employee benefits brokerage and consulting division for Frenkel & Co. in New York. Wellness programs and risk management analytics now go hand in hand in the battle to contain health care costs, he says, and the numbers say that wellness and health awareness are having the hoped-for positive impact. Moreover, the numbers also support the brokerage’s own stronger commitment to wellness services and benefit communications, he notes. Frenkel & Co, one of nation’s oldest property/casualty insurance brokerages, was founded in 1878 and now has 250 employees and offices in New York, California and New Jersey. In 2001, after an employee buyout of previous ownership, Hasday and partner Larry Kirshner formed the Frenkel Benefits LLC division to consolidate employee benefits and related services. In January, Frenkel Benefits acquired Onsite Wellness, its long-time partner in providing wellness services, as a separate operating division of the firm. The benefits unit now has 42 employees, including five wellness specialists with Onsite Wellness. Hasday says the new vision is a dramatic step forward for the firm, allowing it to offer comprehensive wellness services as well as employee benefits and benefits communication consulting—all of which creates a more sophisticated focus on health care cost containment. “Brokers have been following the escalation of health care costs for years and responding by marketing and re-marketing the coverage in order to keep premiums down. Health care cost containment has become a dominant issue, and, as a result, brokers have had to develop a range of support services in employee benefits communication and claims analysis,” observes Hasday. For several years, wellness and health promotion programs have also been on the rise, as an alternative means of controlling health care costs; however, employers have not always been convinced that the programs pay off in lower premiums or in other quantifiable ways, such as increased productivity and decreased lost time. “Employers are always seeking to justify wellness programs with measurable return on investment,” Hasday says. “And now research is starting to indicate that the programs do have a measurable impact on costs. Employers are submitting their programs and their costs to more aggressive and sophisticated analytics and are documenting positive results.” The numbers “have ratcheted up,” he says, making employers more open than ever to wellness programs, risk assessments and work/life programs that support health and productivity. As a result, Hasday says, Frenkel Benefits views wellness services as a natural addition to the services the brokerage has been offering for years. Kenneth Wright, president of Onsite Wellness, says, “Wellness services are the definition of a win-win situation. From the employer’s viewpoint, unhealthy lifestyle is the leading cause of an alarming rise in workplace issues like obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and chronic illness. “Companies see the impact in escalating health insurance premiums and claims costs, increased absenteeism and declining productivity,” he says. From the employee perspective, Wright says, wellness programs can have a dramatic effect on their lives and those of their families. Onsite Wellness conducts a wide range of wellness and health awareness services, Wright says. Health risk assessments for employees are usually the first step in a comprehensive health awareness program and help alert employees to potential health problems. Then, to respond to those concerns, employers may also sponsor biometric testing, such as cholesterol, blood pressure and diabetes screenings, and specific wellness activities, such as weight loss programs and smoking cessation programs. Onsite Wellness and Frenkel Benefits can support the programs with onsite health fairs that coordinate employee benefit plan enrollment with wellness activities and services and health education. Wright says the company brings health awareness directly to employees on the job but also has to continue its communication into employees’ homes. “If they are to be effective, wellness programs need to reach out to dependents as well as employees to encourage a healthy family lifestyle.” Hasday says the acquisition also supports the brokerage’s commitment to the growing trend of health care consumerism and consumer-driven health plan designs. “We see consumer-driven health care not simply as an insurance product. It is a fundamental value shift away from viewing employees as bystanders to seeing them as full partners in health care cost containment. “Our new wellness and employee communication services will be valuable to employers and employees regardless of the type of insurance in place. Specifically, our wellness activities in conjunction with benefits communications services can be a process that can help align the employer’s and the employees’ interests toward more cost-effective use of health care.” Employers and other employee benefits consultants seem to agree that wellness programs are the “wave of the present” in health care cost contain-ment and productivity improvements. A growing number of employers are now offering wellness or work/life programs to employees, and wellness services has become an important niche for employee benefit consultants and vendors. According to a joint survey of 275 employers conducted by Watson Wyatt Worldwide and the National Business Group on Health (NBGH) in Washington, D.C., about 41% of respondents already incorporate health and productivity initiatives into their health care planning and 32% plan to do so within the next year. The 2005/2006 Staying@Work Survey, released late last year, also identified the most popular wellness and work/life productivity programs. They include: —Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs), offered by 94% of respondents —Return-to-work programs, provided by 81% of respondents —Health promotion programs, provided by 75% —Health risk appraisals, provided by 72% —Work and family balance programs, provided by 71% —Paid time-off banks, offered by 40% —Personal health coach or advocate, provided by 40% The survey also noted that the more programs employers offer, the more likely they are to achieve successful productivity outcomes. Fifty-seven percent of employers that provide 20 or more wellness-related programs report better employee understanding of health care and health improvement. Employers who integrate workers compensation, disability, sick leave and family medical leave are also more effective at producing their desired outcomes, such as reduced lost time, improved workforce health and lower costs. However, the survey indicates that employers generally do not provide tangible incentives to employees to improve their health or hold employees accountable. Only half of respondents said they provided incentives to employees for better health; and, while 74% of employers said they believed employees should be held accountable, only 4% actually did so. Why not? Employers cited a lack of actionable metrics (46%) and inadequate access to data (43%) as barriers to accountability. “Overall, employers are not doing very much to encourage employee accountability,” says Helen Darling, NBGH president. “The organizations that work most closely with employees to encourage healthy behaviors will ultimately be successful at closing this gap.” * |
||
|
