Health Is Wealth Without Health

The Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010 to make sure that most people had medical insurance. With this new healthcare system came the responsibility that individuals would have to take initiatives to try to stay or get healthy. The preventative care portion included in the Affordable Car Act is a big item and very important in health care reform and very positive for the American people. Wellness in the workplace has become a very important issue to help reduce companies medical cost, and to help employees get on track to know their numbers, get healthy, and have a positive healthy mental attitude. Many employees do not understand or know how to get healthy and live a healthy lifestyle. With the rising cost of healthcare relating to

The Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010, with the intent of ensuring that most people in the United States have medical insurance. With this new healthcare system came the responsibility that individuals would have to take initiatives in an effort to stay healthy or at the least, increase their level of activity and health awareness, making them more responsible for their own wellness. The preventative care portion included in the Affordable Care Act is one of the fundamental items of the law and is a particularly meaningful, very positive attribute in health care reform for the American people. Wellness in the workplace has become an essential issue to help reduce companies’ medical cost, and to help employees get on track to know their numbers, get healthy, and have a positive healthy mental attitude. Many employees do not understand or know how to achieve and maintain a healthy lifestyle. With the rising cost of healthcare, especially relating to people not taking care of their bodies, wellness in the workplace has become even more critical. Author Lori Breiner (2007) “believes wellness in the workplace has economic benefits for organizations, because if workers are healthy, they miss less time from work.” Breiner’s theory would suggest that better health increases productivity and profits in the workplace.

This article analyzes how workplace health promotion programs aids in prevention strategies. Berry and Mirabito share how critical it is to emphasize whole-person wellness rather than focusing solely on physical health. Including

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

Workplace wellness programs are currently unreflective of the multidimensional and holistic nature of the wellness construct. There exists an opportunity for health promoters to move toward models of workplace wellness promotion that more

Employees are an important part of any organization and organizations need to treat them as thus. In the 21st Century, as a result of changes in the labor markets, organizations are more responsive to worker conditions and this might have resulted in the

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).

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).

Wellness in the workplace needs to be taken seriously by all employers, and employees. There has been evidence that making sure employees eat healthier leads to lower call out rates and more savings on health plans. In an article in Employee Benefits magazine it states that “Wellness management does not need to be complicated, or costly. A few simple steps could help to mitigate long-term problems, such as introducing early intervention activities that red flag cases identified via an absence reporting mechanism, the proactive management of musculo-skeletal conditions and stress, introducing a smoking cessation program or running regular health wellbeing days. “Workplace wellness as a concept has been used extensively in recent years by management in business and industry, health professionals, fitness experts, and others. This is a policy that should be implanted in all jobs. Wellness may not

The Let’s Get Healthy campaign on its face value was indeed laudable and worth undertaking. However, it was unfortunate that after one year, participation in the program was discouraging and that the staff’s interest and enthusiasm fizzled into thin air. What went wrong? For one thing, the organizer of the program apparently conceived the idea on its own without any input from the staff. Also, the program was introduced as a directive from the authority without consideration of the employees right to make their own choices on what goals are best for them and the manner to achieve those goals.

Research indicates that employers can increase employee retention, increase employee productivity, and reduce employee healthcare costs by implementing a workplace wellness program.

Setting the stage for starting a workplace-based wellness program will be the most difficult part. The program can be achieved by getting upper management support and forming a wellness/health services unit to help plan, promote, implement and maintain the program.

Health and wellness in the workplace is crucial to business success. Increasingly, it is recognized that the workplace itself has a powerful affect on people’s health. When people are satisfied with their job, they are more productive and tend to be healthier. When employees feel that the environment at work is negative, they feel stressed. Stress has a large impact on employee mental and physical health, and in turn, on productivity. Companies that promote healthy lifestyle habits for employees to improve their health, often take the success of the company to heart and are likely to be absent less often for health related reasons.

The work by Mayo in the Hawthorne studies demonstrated that the employment relationship was important, and that were employees felt the employer cared and they felt important they were likely to work harder (Gillespie, 1993). Employees regularly state that the best employers are those that provide a workplace which is stimulating and enjoyable, where there is trust and they feel they are treated equitably (Buchanan & Huczynski, 2011). While some of these elements may be assessed by looking at issues such as compensation and working condition, they are all likely to reflect the organizational culture and the attitude towards looking after employees. Therefore, before looking at specific strategies and approaches to different aspects of HR, the concept of culture, which will impact on all areas of operations needs to be considered.

Health is something that you can not buy so people needs to take care of it. Staying healthy should be a priority for everybody that want to live a long happy life without any sicknesses. Living a healthy lifestyle is not easy and requires a lot of work. These days people are working long hours and are extremely busy. They do not have time to eat properly and stay active. Employees spend about a quarter of their time at the office, in which they should consume at least two snacks and lunch. Since the beginning of the year, I am personally trying to live the healthy lifestyle so this topic is close to my heart. My employer offered to pay for my yoga classes which I am so grateful for. This has really changed my life, improved my health,