Case Study - Company Resources as a Priority
Investing in prevention and wellness has short-term implications yet offers long-term benefits for companies. In addition to better employee health, these benefits range from increased productivity and decreased absenteeism to improved employee morale and lower acute care medical costs.
Several Mississippi companies are making their greatest resource, their people, a top priority. See how these companies are improving Mississippi (and their company) one lap around the parking lot at a time.
In 2002, Bill Ray, the President and CEO of BankPlus, established health as a key corporate value. He created WellnessPlus, an independent health promotion department, with a vision to empower employees to live healthy lifestyles, realizing that healthy, happy people are key to a healthy organization.
WellnessPlus is designed to both teach employees to set realistic and achievable health and wellness goals and to facilitate employees to reach these goals by providing interventions to enhance awareness as well as skills and tool sets to practice healthy behavior modifications.
Measurements validate that BankPlus employees are living healthier lifestyles by identifying a downward shift in aggregate modifiable risks. This reflects both a savings of health care dollars and a positive influence on employee performance.
By managing the health and performance of BankPlus employees, WellnessPlus brings value to employees, customers and shareholders while enhancing corporate competitive advantage and long term sustainability.
The Chevron Pascagoula refinery is one of the top ten petroleum refineries in the United States, and Chevron’s largest U.S. refinery. The Refinery currently employs almost 1,300 people, 88% male and 12 % female, and 40% work on a 12-hour rotating shift schedule. Safety and health are core tenets at Chevron, as demonstrated by the “grassroots” employee-driven effort that resulted in the creation of a 10,000 square foot state-of-the-art wellness center on-site at the Pascagoula Refinery, called “Health Quest.” Complete with first-class cardio equipment, weights, aerobics studio and skilled staff, Health Quest is the pulse of the Refinery’s health promotion efforts.
The Health Quest program uses an integrated approach to employee health and offers employees a variety of programs and services to meet a wide range of ever-changing objectives. The program operates with the belief that “The process is the goal!” One of the main driving forces behind the prevention and wellness program’s success is the fact that all Health Quest programs are strategically targeted to fit the unique employee population at the Chevron Pascagoula Refinery, remaining attuned to the changing needs of employees.
Programs include: work conditioning for RTW, ergonomics, support for behavioral based safety, on-site physical therapist, shift-work lifestyle management, Emergency Response Team wellness. Two programs especially popular with employees are the “Healthy Body Challenge,” where employees compete to see who has the most improved health and the “10K-a-Day” program, where employees are challenged to clock 10,000 steps a day on a pedometer.
Snap-on Tools’ comprehensive plan to promote wellness among their employees has taken root in its corporate culture. Since 2004, the company has held yearly wellness fairs. These events include programs on topics such as high blood pressure, blood sugar, dental hygiene, HIV/Aids and smoking cessation. The fairs also involve company-financed flu shots, brochures on health topics such as cancer, AIDS and diabetes, a health spa, disease screening and information on Snap-on’s employee assistance program. Participants walk away with items like toothbrushes, dental floss, sun visors, flavored water, sugarless gum and granola bars. Expenses for the fairs total around $2,300 per event. Around the site, bulletin boards display information on wellness topics. Every employee stretches together every morning to warm muscles and reduce injuries. Vending machines offer a variety of healthy choices. Employees look forward to receiving a newsletter packed with wellness articles every month. Snap-on Tools offers all employees biometrics, detailed personal health reports that allow the individual to be pro-active with their health.
All components of the prevention and wellness program work together to help employees and their families stay healthier;
Mississippi Blood Services (MBS) is a not-for-profit community blood service providing blood and blood components to approximately 50 hospitals in Mississippi, Alabama and Arkansas.
Our worksite wellness experience began in 2006 when our CEO, David Allen, announced the new MBS goal was to establish a workplace wellness initiative. We then attended the Wellness at Work Employer Summit in February of 2006 that was led by major players in workplace health promotion. In March of 2006, we established a volunteer Wellness Committee to begin research and planning for the MBS wellness initiative.
Since we didn’t have the staff available to dedicate sufficient time to development and administration of a comprehensive wellness program, we chose to use WellnessPlus. Elynn Fish began working with us to design and implement our workplace initiative. Fortunately, we have the support of our CEO, who approved an annual budget for the project in excess of $200 per employee.
Our first year, we focused on awareness and making participation in the program easy and fun. Our goals were to achieve 70% participation in the Health Risk Assessment and we achieved 80%, to increase participation in our annual flu shot campaign and achieved participation that tripled the past years, and to have 60% of our workforce successfully meet 10 of the 12 Wellness Goals defined by WellnessPlus which will be determined in August. Participation in the various wellness challenges represents a rate that consistently reaches one-third of our population.
As we are approaching the end of our first year, we conducted a survey resulting in 24% participation. The responses were overwhelmingly positive and indicated increased knowledge concerning foods, personal health, as well as specific behavior changes as a result of newfound knowledge. We believe we are making a positive difference in our employees - especially with respect to current risks of serious illness.
Baptist has been a part of the Metro Jackson community since 1911 and has focused on promoting health and wellness both within our organization as well as within the communities it serves. Baptist is currently making a strong statement concerning tobacco use as all properties owned by Mississippi Baptist Health Systems, Inc. will be tobacco free starting May 29, 2007.
Baptist’s first health promotion program, “EWP - Employee Wellness Program”, began in the early 90’s with the opening of the downtown Fitness Center. All employees receive a significantly discounted rate for using the facility at least eight times per month which encourages employees to be physically active. As EWP continues to grow and evolve, the Fitness Center remains a cornerstone.
Baptist’s employee benefit plan provides wellness benefits ranging from $250.00 - $500.00 annually and provides 100% coverage for mammography and colonoscopy services for those who meet appropriate age/gender criteria.
Baptist Health Systems strives to improve and enhance the quality of life in the State of Mississippi and has recently brought, Dr. Chad Rhoden with a specialty in Disease Management and Health Promotion on board to enrich the services offered to patients, employees, physicians, businesses and the community including educational programs ranging from healthy cooking demonstrations to “Steppin Out”, a walking program sponsored by the Medical Fitness Association, exercise charity events such as the annual Watermelon Classic and a number of low cost screenings are available to Baptist’s employees, businesses and the community at large.