Employers remain committed to investing in wellness programs, despite talk–or stall–of health care legislation in Washington.
According to a new employer study by Fidelity Investments, employers on average are spending nearly 2 percent of their total health care claim dollars annually on wellness programs.
Most have implemented an average of 21 programs focused on prevention, lifestyle wellness, condition management, communication and education. Half (51 percent) of all employers plan to implement at least one additional health improvement program in 2010 and 89 percent expect to maintain the current programs they offer.
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However, more than one in four (27 percent) companies do not measure the outcomes of these programs and 65 percent of companies have no measurable goals for their initiatives.
"Wellness programs are now a standard workplace benefit as employers recognize the need to invest in initiatives that help employees to better manage their health given that health care costs continue to soar," said Sunit Patel, senior vice president of Fidelity's Consulting Services business, which commissioned the study with NBGH. "However when it comes to measurement, wellness programs are in their infancy. Most employers need help establishing clear program goals and measuring the impact these programs have on the overall well being and productivity of their employees."
Other findings from the study:
- Six out of 10 companies with health improvement programs do not know their return on investment across all their programs holistically. Companies ranked outcome measurement as their No. 1 challenge, followed by employee engagement and participation.
- More than half (57 percent) of companies surveyed said they use incentives that have a cash value. The most common incentives offered by an employer are to reduce the employee's health care premium followed by cash and contributions to a health reimbursement arrangement or a health savings account.
- One out of five companies (20 percent) spends more than $400 per employee a year on incentives alone.
- Almost one third (29 percent) spend less than $100 per employee.
Companies are spending almost the same amount of money on programs aimed at prevention and lifestyle wellness (45 percent) as on programs that manage conditions after the onset of disease or illness (43 percent).
Most prevalent programs in the prevention and lifestyle categories:
- On-site flu shots (90 percent)
- Preventive-care reminders related to screenings or annual exams (68 percent)
- Employee assistance programs (92 percent)
- Stress management (68 percent)
- Smoking cessation (66 percent)
Top condition-management programs in use:
- Nurse hotlines where nurses are available to answer questions via telephone (79 percent)
- Diabetes disease management (74 percent)
- Coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure and asthma disease management (69 percent)
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