Employee Progress-Based Incentives

Though it may seem like a good deed providing incentives for employee participation in health improvement campaigns and penalties for lack there of, companies like CVS are doing this only

Foremost, the healthier a society is, the more productive employees are, which boosts revenue. When an employee’s health is in question, an employer may actually lose 77 percent of productivity, making the loss greater than that of health care expenses. These numbers go up with the combination of lack of exercise, 96 percent loss, and unhealthy eating habits, 93 percent loss, said a study from Brigham Young University, according to an article in a 2012 Education Letter. The study included “those who did not believe their workplace environment would support them in becoming physically and emotionally healthier were more likely to

As you know the reason that for CMS and other health care agencies to come up with quality incentive payments (QIP) to enforce compliance and improve quality patient care because of the rising medical costs, staggering patient safety concerns, rampant malpractice. The increasing burden of chronic disease, health insurance fraud and inappropriate pay become a heavy burden that the health care unable to bear financially and it was the impetus for incentive payments. However, some argue that incentive payments are dangerous pernicious because providers may avoid accepting patients with complicated problems and who are simply incompliant of care. Bonis, (2005) stated, ” A potentially even more pernicious outcome of QIPS would occur if providers,

Best health practices and worksite wellness program is about engaging with employees to understand what they want, taking a tactical method about looking at health holistically. According to Lacoma, (1999 -2014), these worksite wellness programs are intended to help the workers upgrade their health and maintain healthy lifestyles. This package includes exercises, variety of care and treatment for various illnesses (mental and emotional health), healthy food, on time check up reminders, outlined health checks assessments, consultations and therapy. Moreover, Engelman (2012) determined that many of the conditions impacting workers were preventable and requires increased amounts of education, screening, encouragement and benefits to help understand how these affect the quality of their lives. These shifts gained prominence during the 1990s from increased research, about the importance of prevention and the advantages it can provide employers inside the marketplace.The recent Affordable Care Act workplace wellness provisions on implementation and expansion of employer wellness programs serves a great means to offer great opportunity of improving the citizen 's health and also control health care spending. The effectiveness and benefits of such programs should be evaluated to encourage opportunities to support healthier workplaces (Kisberg, (2014).

Although, short-term or outcome based financial incentives may be profitable to some, they may not be an effective approach always. For example, some individuals in desire to receive a large amount of incentive to reach the specific health outcome such as weight loss, he/she might choose to starve to reach the target, followed by potential adverse effects later. On the other hand, many individuals fail to maintain healthy behaviors after attaining the health outcomes and on receiving the incentives. Furthermore, Incentives tied exclusively to health outcomes may discriminate those who are in utmost need of health improvement such as the elderly and socioeconomically backward individuals, as outcome-based incentives may unintentionally overcompensate

Instead of viewing healthcare as an expense, this system will cause Americans to think of healthcare as an investment and evaluate services and costs based on the return on investment. If this system is utilized, management will be forced to pay attention to refining the quality of care delivered to patients along with the timeliness and manner, which will lead to better clinical, quality-of-life, and economic outcomes (Watanabe et al, 2004). In order to try to implement this sort of reimbursement system, the system would need to reward specific behaviors that providers and patient’s display. It would also need to reward behaviors it wants to encourage such as preventative medicine. This system would reimburse providers based on the level of commitment they offer towards the health of individuals and the community.

Health in the United States has become a serious issue. With about six in every 10 people suffering from either being overweight or obese in addition to other unhealthy behaviors such as smoking, heavy drinking or lack of exercise. These lifestyle choices have caused a number of chronic illnesses to skyrocket to high rates. “These chronic conditions have become a major burden, as they lead to decreased quality of life, premature death and disability, and increased health care cost” (pg xiii). What the workplace is trying to do is promote a healthier lifestyle for the employee. Some reasons for doing so is that the employer cares about the well being of their employee so that they can be more productive and to help reduce the risk of getting a chronic disease. Since these chronic diseases are becoming more life threatening and the cost of health care is increasing the employers are implementing health promotion and disease prevention strategies also known as workplace wellness programs. “Workplace wellness takes advantages of employers’ access to employees at an age when interventions can still change their long-term health trajectory. The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act supports this trend with several provisions regarding health promotion and also mandated this study” (pg xiii).

Benavides noted that “wellness programs are not a quick fix solution to years of employee disregard for their health condition. In most cases at least a two year window is necessary to begin to see positive results. In any case, it is an option that provides a sustainable way to lower health care costs and improve the physical and mental well being of employees.” Under Obama’s Affordable Care Act, $15 billion over 10 years and another $2 billion each year to follow was allotted for healthcare and evidence-based outcomes (to generate and fund such wellness incentives as this paper proposes). Likewise, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 allotted $160 billion total toward healthcare and wellness with $650 million specifically granted to address chronic disease strategies.

Introduction: The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) contains different policies that are pertinent to expanding health care access when needed, re-shaping insurance and market system, extending the health workforce, reducing the financial burden, and improving quality of care and life. Moreover, the aim of the new law is not only to help people when they get sick, but also to support them to enjoy the diverse initiatives and blessings of public health and preventive medicine and incentives to adopt a better and healthy life.1 Based on this fact, the wellness programs are among many of the policies under the provision of prevention/wellness of the ACA that focus on building a healthier nation by expanding the coverage for preventive services at the workplaces and thus reducing the health care cost.1,2

A Louisiana court held an employer financially responsible for the injured employee’s attendance at a local YMCA for exercise classes. In Oregon, a court found that having an employer pay for an overweight employee’s weight-loss program should be authorized as a workers compensation issue because it improved the injured employee’s health condition. The South Dakota court system found in favor of an injured employee who was seeking financial payment by the employer for attendance in a weight-loss

Incentives color the canvases of the health care delivery system (Biller-Andorno & Lee, 2013). Health care leaders and policy makers need to create a balance so that the certain unintended and ethical consequences are not evident. Creating incentives is challenging because clinicians’ behaviors, patients’ outcomes and organizational principles should not be compromised, and unintended and ethical consequences should be minimized, if not avoided. The “carrot-and-stick” theory is ineffective in changing behavior in health care professionals (Biller-Andorno & Lee, 2013, 980). When creating incentives the four motives outlined by Max Weber should be considered (as cited in Biller-Andorno & Lee, 2013). The four theories are “traditional, self-interest,

In the vending machines all sorts of dried nuts and fruits can be found. For those employees who would like to lose weight, the company offers to pay the membership fee for the gym. With these type of helpful gestures employees will certainly stay healthy. “Companies are expected to spend an estimated $7,720 per employee this estimate is up from the $7,211 a few years ago according to NBGH. With health-care costs expected to continue to rise and cash-strapped employees less able to shoulder more premium increases, employers face a dilemma.”(Marshall P.53)

Incentives are seen everywhere in daily life and they appear in a variety of ways. Whether a person is making a choice between what to eat for lunch or when to go to bed, they are being influence by incentives. For example, images of an appealing lunch meal in a TV commercial may make someone choose Subway over Mcdonalds. However, the same thought process can motivate someone to prefer a meal at McDonalds because of the company’s constant promotion of their “dollar menu” (Mcdonalds, 2013). Either of these incentives can appeal to a person, depending on what they are motivated by, in this case, either health or money.

Since pay honest vigorously impact enlistment, turnover, and representative efficiency, it is critical that candidates and workers see these practices in an ideal light. In the accompanying segment, we talk about how individuals structure discernments around an association 's remuneration framework and how these observations at last influence their conduct.

Today, competition between the businesses is extremely high thus companies need to find ways to be competitive. Organizations prepare the best market strategy to increase the company performance and the ways to keep their employee motivation on the highest level to perform well within the competition. At that time, several incentive pay programs play an important role for every organization to perform well within the competition.