Hospitals are learning they have the tools to do both successfully
More hospitals are reaping substantial savings by interfacing employee health with occupational health. That’s because hospitals and health systems are in a prime position to better serve their employees through wellness programs, injury treatment, and prevention screenings. Many of these services already exist on-site, experts said. If these programs prove successful with internal workers, there is ample opportunity to roll them out to local employers, creating a new and fast-growing revenue stream.
“The more we think about what is happening today in healthcare – a focus on prevention, wellness, and disease management – there’s a module in the community that has all this, and that is occupational health,” said Ms. Donna Lee Gardner, senior principal at RYAN Associates. Ms. Gardner will speak during a special session on this topic at the RYAN Associates’ 26th Annual National Conference in Chicago on Oct. 8 from 3:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. The trend has been accelerating and evolving over the past three to four years, Ms. Gardner said.
Driving the trend are healthcare costs and a focus on employee health to improve productivity and reduce absenteeism. Almost half of all Americans live with a chronic disease related to physical inactivity, diet, and smoking. Meanwhile, workplace risk factors are related to injuries and illnesses. Hospital setting risk factors include back injuries from lifting patients and psychosocial stressors of working in a fast-paced environment. Healthier workers cost less, research shows, and wellness interventions at the worksite can make a difference. Medical costs fall, on average, by $3.27 for every dollar spent on wellness programs, and absentee day costs fall by about $2.73 for every dollar spent, according to a 2010 study by Harvard researchers published in Health Affairs.
“This average return on investment suggests that the wider adoption of such programs could prove beneficial for budgets and productivity as well as health outcomes,” the study authors wrote. Hospitals have, in general, been behind the curve on workplace wellness interventions, Ms. Gardner said. But they are starting to catch on. “It’s like we are the last ones at the table,” she said.
Adoption of electronic medical records is accelerating the trend because EMRs have built-in privacy safeguards that create firewalls between the employer and the worker, Ms. Gardner said. Workers’ compensation information and rehabilitation can be included in EMRs today but with special password protections, she added. Hospitals already have much of what they need to get going at their fingertips. For decades, they have adhered to federal worker safety standards such as administering caregiver vaccines, tuberculosis skin tests, and respiratory surveillance with fit tests, Ms. Gardner said. Now, they can build on this platform by adding wellness coaching, nutritional counseling, and worker injury management.
Unlike employers in other sectors of the economy, hospitals and health services can build these services internally instead of paying outside vendors. By rolling up existing services, hospitals and health systems can service their employees within these functions. In July 2011, the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine called on employers to integrate their safety initiatives with health and wellness programs.
“This is the path to creating a healthier workforce,” said Dr. Pamela Hymel, the paper’s lead author and a past president of ACOEM, in a statement. “While we have made great strides in creating separate cultures of safety and wellness in the United States in recent decades, the two have yet to meet and merge into a truly sustainable culture of health.”
Keeping safety and wellness in separate silos doesn’t help workers or employers, the ACOEM wrote in the paper. Creating a so-called culture of wellness at work seems like a great idea, but putting it into practice, and being successful, requires resources, energy, and a systematic approach, experts agreed. Keys to success include: organizational leadership, promoting employee participation, finding and using the right tools, ensuring confidentiality, measuring and analyzing results, and providing adequate resources, according to Ms. Gardner. Defining provider competencies, creating operational efficiencies, and conducting financial management also are critical, she added.
