Health And Economic Outcomes Of A Workplace Wellness Program
The goal of workplace wellness programs is twofold: improve employee health and lower health care costs for employers and insurers.
A workplace wellness program was implemented at a random subset of worksites within BJ’s Wholesale Club from 2015 to 2017. Zirui Song and Katherine Baicker looked into its effects.
While the program led to better self-reported health behaviors, notably active weight management, the authors found that it did not produce significant differences in clinical measures of health, health care spending and use, or employment outcomes between treatment and control.
“To the extent that these results are representative of other wellness programs, they temper expectations of substantial improvements in health outcomes or financial returns on investment from wellness programs,” wrote Song and Baicker.
Today on Health Affairs Blog, Heather Foster and Margaret Murray discuss Congress’s opportunity to repair, reform, and reinforce the Affordable Care Act by improving affordability, particularly for younger consumers.
Additionally, in part 1 of a two-post series, Hannah Crook and coauthors
discuss the lessons that can be learned from the past decade of value-based payment models.
Finally, Katie Keith discusses the Georgia Access Model, which eliminates the use of HealthCare.gov in Georgia and would make it the only state without a single one-stop-shop marketplace for consumers in need of private health insurance.
Elevating Voices: Pride Month: In 2017, after measures of sexual orientation and gender identity were eliminated from the National Survey of Older Americans Act Participants, Kathy Greenlee, a member of the LGBT+ community herself, penned a Health Affairs Blog post arguing against the change.
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LIVE with Liz Fowler, Director Of The Center For Medicare & Medicaid Innovation
Listen to Health Affairs Editor-in-Chief Alan Weil interview Liz Fowler, Director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, at a live Health Affairs speaker event from June 3, 2021.
Health Affairs is the leading peer-reviewedjournalat the intersection of health, health care, and policy. Published monthly by Project HOPE, the
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