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NetWellness provides the highest quality health information and education services created and evaluated by faculty of our partner universities.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
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NetWellness provides the highest quality health information and education services created and evaluated by faculty of our partner universities.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
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All successful employers know that an effective workforce is comprised of happy, healthy, and committed employees. Wellness programs are designed precisely to establish this kind of workforce. But before beginning to implement a wellness plan it is a good idea to establish a starting point from which to work.
The Partnership For Prevention has released two articles:
These articles are full of ideas for where and how to begin a worksite wellness program. You will also find some useful tools such as surveys and questionnaires that can help you determine the needs of your workforce and assess the success of your future wellness plan.
Learning about the health of your workforce is the first step in establishing a wellness program. This can be done via surveys, health risk appraisals (HRAs) and health care benefit utilization reports.
Conducting this type of assessment provides baseline data on the health of your workforce. Grouping this data provides essential information on the health of your entire population and will give you important information upon which to measure success after implementation of your program. With the information that you obtain from the HRA report(s), you will be able to determine the best areas in which to focus programs and services for maximum benefit.
Assessments may be conducted by your health care provider or another outside resource. The University of Michigan Health Management Research Center is one well-known center that has documented numerous positive results from wellness programs and services for 3+ million people. Their health risk appraisal is one tool that you might choose to utilize within your program to help you better understand the health of the people within your organization. Other assessment available for your use include:
A number of websites exist which provide worksite wellness information. WELCOA (The Wellness Councils of America) offers a step by step process for initiating a wellness program in their Seven Benchmarks of Success.
When initiating a wellness program, deciding if this will be an internally or externally staffed initiative is important. You may have a Human Resources or Benefits employee with prior experience that would be great to involve in the beginning and possibly once the program is implemented. Or, you may decide to rely on outside vendors to plan, implement and evaluate this wellness effort.
This article is a NetWellness exclusive. 
Last Reviewed: Sep 05, 2008
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Elizabeth R. Click, ND, RN, CLE Assistant Professor Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing Case Western Reserve University |
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Please note: only your personal physician or other health professional you consult can best advise you on matters of your health based on your medical history, your family medical history, your medication history, and how information from any of these databases may apply to you. Neither University of Cincinnati (NetWellness) nor any party involved in creating, producing or delivering this web site shall be liable for any damages arising out of access to or use of this web site, or any errors or omissions in the content thereof. (More) 
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