Dear Health Care Executives:

I hope everyone is surviving this winter and completely missed any bouts of winter blues. If you need a little help, here are some ideas:

• Take a brisk walk outside, breathe in the fresh air, and just look at your beautiful surroundings
• Get on an elliptical machine at a gym or community center for just 10 minutes
• Buy flowers at the store to brighten up your house – a little color and fresh scent will do wonders for your mood
• Volunteer at a church or organization; giving back helps you to realize just how lucky you are
• Simply just smile at another person – it’s contagious. 

This edition of the Benefits and Wellness Bulletin (BWB) will inspire you and your employees to stay motivated and save benefit claim dollars along the way. This edition will also provide new ways to inspire and invigorate your thought process and possibly save you dollars in all of your organizations as it pertains to wellness and benefits. You can even read this edition of the BWB on your smart phone while on a treadmill – to learn more, click here. We are here to help inspire you and your employees around improving your life and wellbeing.

ASHHRA appreciates your dedication to health care, and we will continue to improve in assisting you in the way you do your work. Please feel free to email me at sdrake@aha.org for any reason – we are here to serve you, our valued members.

Sincerely,

What do you get when you mix trillions of dollars in assets and a quasi-ignorant understanding of finance? Generation X and Generation Y consumers. More than half of U.S. Gen X and Gen Y consumers admit having little or no knowledge about investments and financial products, according to a recent LIMRA study.

The adoption of consumer-driven health savings account (HSA)-qualified health plans continued its strong growth in 2012 with HSAs having grown an estimated $15.5 billion in assets, representing more than 8.2 million accounts.

Employers have a vested interest in encouraging their workers to do things like eat right, exercise and not smoke: Healthy employees generally are more productive and have lower medical costs than their less-healthy colleagues.

Your workplace wellness campaign may be missing a huge opportunity. And it’s all because of how you define the word "wellness." Or rather, how you don’t define it. Employers use "wellness" in their communication as their go-to term for physical health. There’s nothing wrong with that. But for your employees and their families, a healthy life is about much more than a healthy Body Mass Index (BMI).

A new study sheds light on the health care benefit participation rates of part-time workers and how they might shift in 2014 when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act mandates affordable coverage for employees who work more than 30 hours a week.

According to the Principal Financial Well-Being Index: American Workers, 62 percent of workers believe workplace wellness activities are successful in improving health and reducing health risks, up from 55 percent in 2011.

Wellness programs are no longer a "soft" issue for organizations around the globe as employers increasingly recognize the value of employees' health and overall wellbeing to their organizations' bottom line, according to a report from Buck Consultants. Employers cite their commitment to promoting health and wellness as a business strategy and show continued desire to expand health promotion initiatives.

As the market is preparing for the health care exchange system in 2014, voluntary benefits are expected to play a larger role, says Andrea Meyer, benefit manager of WorkSmart Systems Inc., a professional employer organization in Indianapolis. Even under health care reform, medical insurance is projected to continue with its high deductibles, and voluntary benefits complement these plans.

The average 401(k) balance hit $77,300 at the end of 2012, up from $69,100 one year earlier – a 12 percent increase, according to an analysis of Fidelity Investments accounts. The fourth-quarter average balance tops the previous quarter's high of $75,000. About two-thirds of the 2012 increase was attributable to market action, while one-third was due to participant contributions. 

Since 32 percent of employers reported that top performers left their organizations in 2012 and 39 percent are concerned that they'll lose top talent in 2013, many are asking current employees for feedback on how to increase job satisfaction. According to a new CareerBuilder survey, 26 percent of workers said that providing special perks is an effective way to improve employee retention. Here are the 10 that scored highest when workers were asked to identify one perk that would make their workplace more satisfying.

While some healthcare organizations remain skeptical of the ACO movement, they can utilize their own employees for proof of accountable care success, according to a white paper published yesterday by Evolent Health.

Employee benefits is fast becoming one of the largest expense items for employers and this issue will be magnified as healthcare reform unfolds. There are approximately 5,000 U.S. hospitals in and 1,000 of them would fall into the category of rural and community hospitals. Typical staff counts in the smaller facilities range from 150–300 people. Large multi-hospital systems might have as many as 15,000–30,000 employees.

ASHHRA wants to share a new employee health initiative at Palmetto Health where our own board member, Amy C. Barry, is human resources system vice president. Some of the stairwells now have humorous sayings on the stairs, directional stickers on the floor and motion sensors that cheer you on as you climb the stairs. The stairwell campaign is an initiative created by myHealth Rewards as part of Palmetto Health’s new Health and Wellbeing Services department. The goal of the campaign is to encourage employees to improve their health by showing them that incorporating physical activity into their daily routines can be as simple as taking the stairs instead of the elevator. myHealth Rewards staff is on prize patrol and rewarding employees caught in the act of taking the stairs. 

Baptist Memorial Hospital – Memphis CEO Derick Ziegler wakes up at 4:30 every morning to go for a 4½-mile run. Not only did serving in the military for 23 years inspire a commitment to health and fitness, but losing his father suddenly at a young age due to a heart attack also led him to put even greater emphasis on a healthful lifestyle. Running a facility that focuses on health, Ziegler sees it only fitting to spread his enthusiasm for fitness, so last summer he and his staff rolled out a wellness program for the hospital's 3,000 employees.

Health care is a huge subject right now, regardless of your views on the Affordable Care Act. And for good reason. According to the Kaiser Foundation, the cost of employer-sponsored health coverage for families has increased nearly 100 percent during the past decade. In addition, total health spending accounted for approximately 18 percent of the U.S. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2010.

More than 30 hospital and health system executives discussed their ideas about the transition from volume to value, lowering costs while improving quality, new care delivery models, and stakeholder alignment, among other topics, as part of Chicago-based Huron Consulting's Healthcare CEO Forum. Here are some excerpts from the executives' thoughts on new care delivery models, as quoted in Huron's report from the forum. 

Some companies have turned to coercive or mandatory wellness programs to push employees toward better health. And some employee groups have pushed back. Experts suggest employers and HR leaders be careful to design programs that reward healthy behaviors rather than punish unhealthy ones.

After 10 years of nursing, everything in my body hurts most of the time. I still get sick, though not as often as I did right at the beginning, and sometimes stress takes a toll on my tummy. There are some things, like occasional indigestion, that you can work through. There are other things you should never, ever ignore – you could wind up in the hospital as a patient yourself! Here are the top five pains, aches and bodily whines you need to deal with right away, no matter how busy your day/week/month may be. Your coworkers, family and, um, YOU will thank you! 

It’s no secret that keeping employees healthy saves businesses money – and nobody knows this better than the healthcare industry. Susan Moriconi, vice president of human resources at Omnicell, a medication and supply automation company based in the San Francisco Bay area, has helped implement a wellness program at her company and says it can be simple and very effective. 

Employees of the American Licorice Company are not only proud to celebrate nearly 100 years of making Red Vines and other yummy treats; they also relish the company-sponsored wellness programming.

More U.S. workers recognize the rewards of participating in workplace wellness programs, according to the Principal Financial Well-Being Index: American Workers. Sixty-two percent of workers, up from 55 percent in 2011, believe workplace wellness activities are successful in improving health and reducing health risks.

Generally speaking, employers have long since made the connection between a healthier workforce and improved productivity. Still, corporate wellness initiatives are sometimes viewed as "nice extras" as opposed to critical, must-have programs with bottom-line implications.

Employers are just now starting to take notice of the merits of programs aimed at reducing employee stress – and the costs associated with stress – by training the brain to have a positive outlook.