So, is there any level of interest in hearing about the exercise in humiliation that is my workplace's wellness program? No? Well, not every day can be Tess Is A Relationship Trainwreck Day, now CAN IT, you greedy bastards?
So this morning, I had my blood drawn (they had to pierce BOTH ARMS! Fucking GAH! Newborn vampire status cemented!), and also was weighed and measured and blah blah. Pretty much a typical workday when you're a CPA, right? Anyway, it should come as no surprise that I was WICKED CRANKY after fasting for 12 hours*, INCLUDING NO BLACK COFFEE OMFG. (!!) I honestly can't remember the last time I saw 9:30 am without a single cup of coffee. It's been YEARS. True disgusting story.
*Text from me to NotDate2 last night: "how fussy are they on this 12 hrs thing, cuz I'm about to kill the rest of this bottle of wine" NotDate2: "um. rock on, but you might want to chase it w/ some cardboard"Anyway. I talked a little bit about how the program works in the comments on Friday, but here's the gist for you SKIMMAHS:
Basically, our wellness program is Outcomes-Based, which is a nice way of saying IT PUTS THE "HEALTHY" LOTION IN THE BASKET OR IT GETS THE HOSE. You are either going to 1) be healthy to begin with, through some combination of luck, genetics, or hard-ass work; 2) take steps to become healthy, as defined by the company; or 3) wish you had.
These are the things we use to measure "health":
- Cardiovascular fitness, measured by a timed run or VO2 max on a walk test
- Waist circumference
- Blood pressure
- Fasting glucose
- Cholesterol Risk Ratio (Total cholesterol/HDL cholesterol)
- Tobacco use
These things are all tested once per year, at the beginning(ish) of the year. If you meet the criteria for each item, based on your demographics, you get $300. If you DON'T, you can still get $300, but you have to participate in health kick-y shit throughout the year and earn a certain number of "points". You can choose not to particpate AT ALL in the program, but if you do that your health insurance premiums will be higher than those who DO participate/meet the criteria. As an added bonus, at my company, there is an element of Political Suicide associated with not participating. Um. Unofficially. (slash Officially).
So! I know you are dying to know what I think of this business! I'm not against it. It's perfectly legal, and also sort of the Wave Of the Future, like it or not. To me, it's no different than charging more for car insurance if you have 17 speeding tickets and aren't willing to go to defensive driving. Also, you'll notice that, with the possible exception of waist circumference, none of these metrics are directly tied to weight. If they were, I might feel differently.
At any rate, as long as "liver function" and any and all measures of MENTAL-slash-EMOTIONAL health stay out of the picture, I should be okay. Heh.
So, do any of YOUR workplaces have worksite wellness programs? I'm DYING to know about them, if so. NO, REALLY. Dig those flyers out of the Round File and scan 'em over.
30 comments:
I work for a really small company that doesn't even provide us with health insurance, but rather just gives us a tax-free stipend monthly to purchase health insurance on our own. Works great really.
I work for a small company, too. Wellness program? Well...No.
Hmm...Well, I was definitely interested in the explanation (it's not better than a dating trainwreck, but it IS better than nothing!). And I'm still not sure how I feel about this. I would probably FAIL on three of those criteria, but three of them would probably be fine to good. So it seems more fair than I had initially thought. I do not like that not participating carries both a monetary and political penalty. Opting out should always be an option.
And yeah, my company has a worksite wellness program. It's called we go out and drink as much as we can. On the company tab.
At my (old) work, which was an Academic Institution, we had some kinda flier that came around related to some kinda health thing. Since it didn't come with any rewards/ punishments, I pretty much ignored it. Okay, I went to a health fair once and got cheap blood tests.
The idea of being required to exercise for work makes the redcoat rebel in me get all cranky--even though I do exercise!
At least they don't, you know, PUBLICALLY POST YOUR RESULTS or anything. Right? Please tell me they don't do this?
Shelly-I think it's important to note that, even if you "fail" certain criteria, you can still get the $300/avoid the premium increase by participating in the "interventions" (lectures/fitness challenges/blah blah)
This is endlessly fascinating for me. Since I'm in Canada it doesn't really apply!
Ugh. I'm not thrilled about this just because I have a lot of opinions about how fitness and weight are linked and even though a lot of these criteria don't relate directly to weight, they do seem like they could easily lend themselves to stigmatizing certain people. You know?
But it sounds like you can still earn the lower premium/whatever by DOING the stuff, even if you don't see RESULTS? Is that right? Because that's the part that worries me. Like, your waist circumference might stay too high but if you're doing the workouts and attending the lectures and whatnot, you don't have to pay? Because if that's not how it works then that's a problem. For me, at least.
Regardless, I am GLAD I don't have to do this. I don't even want to look into increasing my life insurance because I so do not want someone to come tell me how healthy or otherwise I am. I have a doctor, I'm on a long-term fitness regime, and for me things like my weight and waist circumference are private and sources of pain, and not something that I want discussed or recorded at a workplace. Regardless of how fit I am or am trying to be.
As someone who's not had a lot of trouble being healthy, I'd say those kinds of programs sound fine to me. Except for the fasting bit.
But it's always the people who don't fit into some norm who can point out the flaws of such things, so I'd be interested to hear them.
No wellness program over here.
my girlfriend's workplace has a similar thing - she gets ACTUAL CASH if she follows a fitness regime and tracks her progress on a website - but my workplace has nada. except they will pay $30/month toward any type of gym membership / exercise programmy thing, which is pretty awesome. and also not contingent on you GOING to the gym or seeing results, just PAYING for a gym :-)
I'd be okay with this. But, as Penny pointed out above, I don't think I'd have much of a challenge complying.
We have a whole Employee Health & Wellness department. They put on wellness fairs, bring in inspirational speakers, host fitness-type events and challenges. There are always prizes involved (iPods, gym memberships, etc), but nothing tied to insurance premiums, etc. (not really a factor here). It's more about making this a happy place to work. Hmm.
OK I keep thinking about this and I have more to say. First of all with what I said above I meant that the way that fitness and weight are linked in people's minds in terms of social stigma. In case that wasn't clear.
Second of all, I can totally see the reasoning behind these programs and I generally think that they are a good idea--pushing people to be healthy and giving them an incentive to do so is good. But charging people MORE not to participate... well, it just worries me.
I guess my feeling is that a program like this definitionally has to set even parameters for everyone and not take into account individual situations. So like, I would probably not meet a lot of those objective measures even though my cholesterol and blood pressure and blood sugar are all at perfectly healthy levels. And I get a lot of exercise and eat well and monitor my thyroid condition and go to the doctor regularly and work with him on what is the best fitness and health regime for me. So by my standards, I'm as healthy as I can be and am working to become more so. But by your standards, I would probably not be able to meet those fitness challenges. What's a challenging and calorie-burning exercise for me would probably just be a light warmup stretch for you.
And a workplace program doesn't allow for that kind of difference, or for the different limitations and barometers of health that different people have. It creates peer pressure to be healthy, but that also creates space for the stigmatization of people who don't APPEAR to be healthy, whether or not they are working on becoming so at their own pace, or whatever genetic limitations they might have that prevent them from meeting the criteria.
And those people, the ones who will already struggle to pass the fitness tests and meet the challenges and whatnot, those are exactly the ones for whom it will be a huge source of pain to have themselves weighed and measured and whatnot AT WORK. And those are the ones for whom this could cause unhealthy emotional reactions. Seriously just THINKING about having to go through this sort of thing at the workplace makes me want to cry. It's just so private and personal, between me and my doctor, and not something that I would ever ever ever want to have to deal with at work.
People who are overweight or out of shape already worry that they're facing prejudices. I always freak out when I go to a job interview that whoever is interviewing me is going to think I'm fat and not be able to look past that--even though I have been offered every single job I have ever interviewed for.
There are certain barometers of health that I don't think would create as much pressure and negative emotion for people who are overweight or out of shape. Like going for a yearly physical, or exercising at all. But it's when you set these blanket goals for everyone to meet... that's when it scares me, and brings up a lot of emotions that I would really rather not associate with my job.
Umm...well I work at a place where stress levels are high and heavy drinking is encouraged. My boss lets us leave early at least once and up to three times a week for happy hour but the kickers is we can't leave UNLESS we go to happy hour. True story. One time we took off on an average Wednesday morning at 8 a.m. IN A PARTY BUS. So...nope no wellness program here.
We do something similar at my company (also Darla's company). I don't really mind except for the waist measurement. I am very much in the healthy weight range for my height (and workout pretty regularly) but tend to carry excess weight around my stomach. I beat myself up about this enough without getting more pressure from work!
Good ol' state employment does not lend itself to monetary incentives for health kicks. I can just imagine that being debated during the legislative session!
Our insurance does however provide us with certain discounts at places like Curves (heh!) and we can call and sign up for our own personal "life counselor" who will discuss/create a meal plan and exercise plan for you. So I guess that's something. Free money though sounds WAY better.
We have a wellness initiative. Since our high deductible health plan is both free, and the best deal if even if you max out the usage (premium of other plans + copays are more than the cost of actual services when receieved at the lower rate provided to the insurance company). None of their stuff is mandatory and there's not testing, but since the insurance is essentailly self-insurance there is an incentive to have your employees be healthy (e.g. our company funds the plan, we just contract through United Healthcare to use their networks and claims and billing stuff.) They have a weight watchers group and they have a "biggest loser" contest (which you can join without joining weight watchers.) They had a stop smoking initiative. All of which are not mandatory, and there's usually a reward, but no punishment if you don't participate.
Does he text in comic sans font too? Heh.
I've not worked for a company with that kind of health incentive. I have mixed feelings. As you describe? Not particularly awful. But it is a slippery slope to some other disturbing things (including mental health evals).
SO MANY awesome comments, thank you guys!
I have a Thing to go to, but I want to respond more later. Keep 'em comin.
Does my workplace do something that might encourage someone to spend time doing something other than billing clients? That would be a NO.
I work for the federal government and they don't really give a damn if we're healthy or not. However, because of where I work we have an decent on-site gym that costs only $40/year, so I don't have much excuse not to exercise except when work is from hell and I have no time during the day.
At my old job, we had this once annual 8 week long fitness encouragement program. If you completed it, which meant like and hour of exercise EACH WEEK, you got 1/2 day of leave. And you would get fitness credit for pretty much everything except breathing.
At my previous workplace, we had this same concept. Our height, weight, total cholest., were measured annually. We also had required, confidential phone calls once a quarter with our "health advisor" or some such. (They only recommended things like "walk more," "drink more water," etc. - no real advice and no measure of our TAKING the advice or not.)
One year we did have to log our fitness activities online, but there was no requirement on how MUCH we accomplished, only that we TRY. (And it was one of those things where you could log "housework" and "grocery shopping" as physical activity.)
Basically everyone saw it as a Pain in the A., but we all wanted that $300 off our premium, so we did it.
The point is, obvs., that they're trying to encourage preventive healthcare measures to decrease the likelihood that they'll have to pay for employees' heart attacks, right?
I haven't read all the comments but I, like you, think it's the "wave of teh future" and it never felt discriminatory to me. They made sure it wasn't, actually; that it was just "advice," and "up to you," and you just had to play their game, not necessarily WIN at health.
My workplace doesn't do anything like this, but I'd be ALL FOR IT (as long as they don't up your premiums for... um... frequent pregnancies and little boys who require glueing of wounds back together on a bi-weekly basis).
In theory, love it. I'm all about carrots to encourage people to wise up about their health. And, as a healthy person, it does kind of (secretly) piss me off that my health insurance is so high because other people can't be bothered to eat vegetables and go for a walk.
In reality, it kind of leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I think it's the unofficial/official political pressure that gets me. No one, and I mean no one, outside of maybe an HR person should know anything about anyone's health status or health insurance situation. It seems like such an invasion of privacy. And the work weigh-ins? Feels Big Brotherish.
Man, I'm hard to please.
In many ways, I think this is a great idea. I think anything that encourages health and prevention is a good thing.
However, I would like to see (and maybe they do already?) gym memberships offered as part of the deal, and maybe an hour of work time allotted to the gym. Folks in the lower-paying positions might not have these resources available to them, and then would get stuck with a $300 higher bill to boot.
Also, even though weight isn't part of the screening, I still get a smidge twitchy about the waist circumference. While there are many studies that show certain waist circumferences are correlated to a number of chronic diseases, I think there are many, many healthy, active people who would not fit into the "acceptable" margin and would therefore get dinged. Kind of similar to my concern with BMI numbers and what constitutes "obese."
Ok. Rant over.
Oh, I totally get the Unofficial/Official pressure thing. I used to unofficially have to pay hundreds of dollars to key members of Congress in fundraisers for my old job in DC. That was fantastic. First you pay me jack shit, then unofficially require hundreds of dollars back to kiss the ass of particular Senators and Congress Members. Grrrrr.......
I'm still stuck on the confidentiality. Doctor/patient privilege is supposed to be so sacrosanct, this just bugs me. I don't mind them encouraging health and fitness, but I don't like the invasion of privacy.
Hmmm... It's not necessarily the privacy issue that bugs me about this whole set up, it just feels more like blatant discrimination. So do they not hire anyone unless they can pass this physical? Is this a company full of physically attractive and healthy people?
I have high cholesterol, definitely hereditary, am a few (okay 20) pounds overweight, drink like a fish, sneak a few smokes in ocassionally, like to sit on my ass eating pop tarts while watching tv so the exercising thing it out, but I'm damn good at my job. Would all that keep me from working at your company? Hmmm...
I love this post since HR is my former "profession". I was the one running that damn cheerleading wellness department and I could see the look of fear in people's eyes as I approached every Monday morning. Sometimes I'd start talking about how exercise and good nutrition really can improve your work performance just to freak people out. Fun times....
I want to know where MANDY works and would like to inquire of her, Do you need any psychiatric Registered Nurses there, because I will make myself available immediately....
Your co.'s program scares me, not because of what it is now (borderline intrusive), but with tweaking, what it could become. And there's ALWAYS tweaking. It all starts out as a little nudge, and then when we get used to that level of intrusion, it becomes a push, and then a big brick to the backside of the head. And there's not too much distance between encouraging good health to keep costs low (because that's what it's about) and keeping the smokers/drinkers/fatties/hypercholesterolemics/hypertensives and oldsters (anyone over 40) out of the organization completely to push those healthcare costs even lower. My company's health provider calls us--during the dinner hour--just like a freaking telemarketer, to discuss ways we can control our blood pressure/weight/stress level by exercising, dieting, etc. They know, of course, what medications you're taking and whether you're overweight and what you're diagnosed with, so they're not just whistling in the dark but providing "targeted" advice. Scary. Next thing, they'll be observing you through little cameras in your house: "I see you have a CANDY BAR in the drawer and a bottle of gin...and do you think you really needed to drink that third glass of wine?"
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