Corporate Workplace Fitness – Has your desk been replaced by a treadmill?

By Douglas Robb on May 27, 2008@healthhabits

More and more employers are instituting voluntary health / fitness programs for their employees in an attempt to reduce rising insurance costs.

In the U.S., the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) allows employers to adjust benefits and insurance premiums based on whether their employees have met the standards of a corporate wellness program. The new rules apply to group health plans and went into effect last July.

While the new rules prohibit discrimination, they do allow employers to offer rewards to nonsmokers, employees with a LDL cholesterol level under 200 or a BMI below 25.

Here is where it gets a little bit 1984.

While employers can’t tell an obese employee to lose weight or a smoker to quit, they can require the heavy employee to participate in nutrition classes and the smoker to track their smoking habits.

Usually these programs are administered and monitored by a third party company. This company’s responsibilities would include assessing the health risk of the employees, helping them set goals, providing the wellness services and monitoring their efforts/results.

They are also the judge of whether or not the employee achieved their wellness goals. If the employee met their particular goals, they would receive their wellness incentive (usually a reduction in their insurance contribution). If they didn’t, there would be a financial penalty.

So what do you think?

Is this a good thing or a bad thing?

If you like what you see here, click here for updates or Share this Post with the rest of the world.

If you are interested in a better way to eat, click here or here or here.

Thanks.

You Searched For...

Doug Robb is a personal trainer, a fitness blogger and author, a competitive athlete, and a student of nutrition and exercise science. Since 2008, Doug has expanded his impact by bringing his real-world experience online via his health & fitness blog, Health Habits. Read more posts by Doug at Hive Health Media.

← Previous Story New Research – Low Glycemic Diet Reduces Risk of Diabetes

Next Story → New Diet Drug offers an Alternative to Obesity Surgery

2 Comments

Sherry

August 20, 2012 at 11:52 am

I think company wellness plans are a fantastic idea, for the health of the workers, and will save the companies a couple of bucks if they promote healthy lifestyles and reward employees who live them. I think it will be tough to come up with numbers for a company to “rate” its employee’s by as everyone has a different concept of health. There are some factors that are as easy as black and white. Does the worker smoke?? With the scientific studies, and death rates/sick days from smoking (yes I understand not EVERY smoke has lots of sick days.. however.. statistically 100 smokers experience more health problems then 100 non-smokers).

Cholesterol and blood pressure numbers are FACT – these would be easy statistics to use to rank companies employee health.

I am from the new generation (28 years of age), and hope that health and wellness promotion evolve over the next few decades. Life and death have changed drastically in the last 50 years, as well as scientific research. Smoking may have been the cool thing to do 50 years ago.. but now you are putting your life in someone elses hands.. I think the new generation cares more about health and wellness as we are the ones living through our grandparents and parents going through health scares or dying from fully preventable causes. ( I personally have lost a grandparent to smoking who started smoking at 12 years old).

I hope my kids don’t have to say to me “why would you have done that to yourself mom – didn’t you know it was unhealthy or bad for you??” There is too much intelligence out there to make these same mistakes.

Reply
swfreedomlover

May 27, 2008 at 3:35 pm

There was a time that I could have understood the sense in these new policies. However, these days, I do NOT agree with them. I’m sorry, my private life and what I do off the clock is NOT my employers business.

And excuse me, BUT what’s with this “one size fits all” standards? This is utter BS. All my life my blood pressure has been 90/60 (my ex husband used to ask if I was even alive LOL). That’s the low end of the normal range. I smoke, I drink coffee (back then I drank ONLY coffee all day long – 8 – 12 mugs per day-regular coffee too), I eat salt……or rather I crave salt and over eat it (I salt all my foods before even tasting it). And still that was my blood pressure. As I got older my tastes changed, and while I still smoke, my coffee intake is down to about 3 cups per day, and my salt intake is at least half of what it used to be. These days my blood pressure runs anywhere from 115/75 to 120/80. I got older, started drinking less coffee, using less salt (just a change in tastes not deliberate cut backs) and my blood pressure went up – yes it’s perfect now but still up from what it used to be.

I am against anyone telling me what I am supposed to weigh. They don’t know me or my body type at all. We all don’t fit into neat little boxes.

I notice these “wellness” programs have set numbers and god help you if your genetic makeup doesn’t allow you to fit into THEIR standard.

One person’s healthy state is another’s UNhealthy state. And I refuse to play this 1984 Stepford type being game.

Reply