The Affordable Care Act has several provisions to encourage widespread adoption and creation of wellness care programs. Beginning next year, $200 million in grants will be made for small businesses to create wellness programs if they did not have one in place as of March 2010. Also in January, new requirements will be placed on programs tied to an employee’s personal health status such as his or her body mass index, while other programs such as gym membership rebates and diagnostic testing will be exempt from new regulations.The Kaiser Family Foundation offers a useful snapshot of the current adoption of such programs in the overview Wellness Programs and Risk Assessments from its Employer Health Benefits 2012 Annual Survey. The survey found 94 percent of large firms (200 or more employees) and 63 percent of small firms (3-199 employees) surveyed offer at least one of the specified wellness programs that included: weight loss programs, biometric screening, smoking cessation programs, lifestyle or behavioral coaching, gym membership discounts or on-site exercise facilities, classes in nutrition or healthy living, web-based resources for healthy living and a wellness newsletter.
To encourage employee participation, the survey noted that 41 percent of large firms and 10 percent of small firms offer some form of financial incentive with the majority of those firms choosing to reward workers with gift cards, travel, merchandise or cash. Surprisingly, few organizations reported offering workers the ability to pay a smaller percentage of their health insurance premium: only two percent of small firms and 14 percent of large companies.
A valued provider of healthcare in the community, Holy Cross Hospital in Fort Lauderdale is committed to providing all Associates opportunities that promote and support a healthier lifestyle. In 2010, we implemented our Healthy Lifestyle Incentive Program which offers a $260 insurance premium discount per year for individual Associates and a total of $520 combined insurance premium discount for an Associate and spouse who both participate.
The goals of the program are two-fold: to offer a comprehensive, high quality wellness program designed to foster an awareness of internal and external health and wellness resources while also integrating Holy Cross health management initiatives to manage increasing trends in healthcare costs.
Participants in the program earn points for participating in various activities and initiatives then providing documentation to the hospital’s Associate Health Office. For instance, a doctor’s note stating an Associate has completed his or her annual physical is worth 48 points. Participants need to accumulate 132 points in one year to be eligible for the full $260 discount.
In 2012, participants in the Healthy Lifestyle Incentive Program were also enrolled in the Zero Co-Pay program. This program offers a zero co-pay for generic prescriptions for high blood pressure, cholesterol control and diabetes. This adds a disease management component to the Holy Cross Wellness Program.
Examples of healthy lifestyle behaviors that are rewarded include:
• Completing preventative care measures such as getting a flu vaccine and doctor-prescribed preventive screenings;
• Making lifestyle and behavior choices such as not smoking/completing a smoking cessation program or being a member of the Zachariah Family Wellness Pavilion;
• Maintaining health indicators such as body mass index, cholesterol levels and blood pressure within recommended guidelines;
• Learning about medical conditions, preventative steps and treatment options at free lectures offered by the non-profit hospital’s physicians; and
• Participating in healthy leisure activities such as completing a 5K race or a triathlon.
While the Healthy Lifestyle Incentive Program is only one of the wellness programs Holy Cross Hospital offers along with health fairs, healthy meal offerings in the cafeteria and ongoing health and wellness education, the participation of 627 employees and spouses in the program last year indicates that offering an insurance premium deduction to incentivize employees to participate in a wellness program deserves consideration and more wide-spread adoption.
