Wellness Case Research: Lorain County Public Well being

How Lorain County Public Well being Achieves Excessive Engagement, Higher Well being & Decrease Prices with WellSteps

One of many greatest challenges in any wellness program is participating a various group of workers with various pursuits and wishes. Lorain County Public Well being, a WellSteps consumer, affords an exemplary mannequin of success. This wellness case research highlights how their program achieves excessive participation from workers throughout a number of departments, delivering measurable well being outcomes and substantial value financial savings.

Lorain County Public Well being Wellness Program Overview

Lorain County Public Well being is devoted to enhancing the well being of Lorain County, Ohio’s 316,000+ residents by way of varied wellness initiatives. The general public company is comprised of a number of departments with practically 150 workers, underscoring the necessity for a complete wellness program that caters to various wants and pursuits. 

Since 2018, Lorain County Public Well being has been enrolled within the WellSteps Foundations program, which options:

• An app and on-line program middle for each worker
• Reward and incentive monitoring
• Habits change campaigns
• Gamified challenges
• Private well being assessments
• Screening reminders
• Wearable machine syncing
• MyStory social platform to share images and messages
• Recipe and video libraries with on-demand health courses
• Wellness Information You Can Use – a library of related wellness articles

RELATED: Uncover the WellSteps Foundations Program

Wellness Case Research Success Tales

This wellness case research exhibits how Lorain County Public Well being’s program achieves success by way of improved worker well being, excessive engagement, and decreased prices.

Improved Worker Well being

Since becoming a member of WellSteps, Lorain County Public Well being has seen a marked enchancment in worker wellbeing. Stephanie Lesco, Supervisor, Administrative Providers Division – who coordinates this system alongside Administrative Providers Division Supervisor Michelle Crossan – says workers have stopped smoking, participated in biometric screenings, and routinely work out within the company’s on-site health middle. 

“One in every of our recurring month-to-month actions is to go to our health room thrice in a month, and we’ve seen that individuals who don’t usually go to the gymnasium are comfy coming in to work early, staying late, or utilizing our health tools throughout lunch,” Stephanie says. 

Biometric screenings have helped workers who don’t routinely get medical checkups gauge their well being ranges – and in a single case, even helped an worker detect a medical situation so they may get remedy.

“One in every of our greatest success tales is a few previous director who didn’t go to the physician, do bloodwork, or screening, however due to our wellness program, she went in for screening and came upon she had a critical medical concern,” Stephanie says. 

Although Lorain County Public Well being affords incentives within the type of HSA contributions, in addition they get participation from workers who aren’t on the insurance coverage plan – an indication that their program is having a optimistic impression on worker wellbeing.

“I hear folks speak concerning the campaigns and actions within the lunchroom, and I’d say that’s one thing that’s not regular dialog in the event that they’re not engaged in this system,” Stephanie says.

RELATED: Wholesome Workers: An Vital Issue for Office Productiveness

Excessive Wellness Program Engagement

Lorain County Public Well being’s wellness program earns excessive engagement by way of a number of initiatives. 

Management

“Lorain County Public Well being has advanced fantastically over the course of six years, and so they have nice participation. I attribute their stage of engagement in the beginning to their inside wellness staff,” says WellSteps information Michelle Jarvis. “They’ve two most important wellness coordinators which might be the driving power and are extremely engaged. Additionally they have recruited wellness champions for every division and maintain quarterly wellness conferences. Collectively, the wellness staff pushes initiatives and vital communications to their staff members”

Michelle and fellow WellSteps information Caroline Kohlbrenner collaborate with Stephanie to steer Lorain County Public Well being’s wellness program towards success. Communication is essential for participation, and Lorain County Public Well being’s wellness coordinators guarantee all workers are stored updated. 

“We hold pushing wellness. It’s not one among this stuff we simply count on workers to do on their very own,” Stephanie says. “We spotlight actions in our month-to-month publication. We now have wellness champions from every division who work straight with their staff to advertise wellness. We maintain employees conferences to coordinate challenges. We don’t simply say, ‘hey, now we have this program.’ We hold it on the forefront of everybody’s thoughts.”

RELATED: How Leaders Can Help Worker Wellness

Worker Suggestions

Lorain County Public Well being routinely asks for workers suggestions to allow them to regularly enhance their wellness program to satisfy the wants of its workers. 

“Their committee listens to suggestions from contributors, and so they implement actions to make sure they’ve an all-inclusive program,” Michelle says. 

Stephanie says the management staff works to make sure their program delivers worth, doesn’t go stale, and permits all workers to take part. 

“Participating workers within the creation of this program is vital,” she says. “We might not get participation if it was created in a bubble with the wellness staff. I believe our wellness reps have finished a very nice job of going again to every division, displaying they care and wish suggestions. Our departments are completely different sufficient that what a staff in administrative providers would possibly want is completely different than what a staff in inhabitants well being would possibly want. We now have a various employees, so we work to seek out issues that enchantment to all of them.”

Strategic Planning

Lorain County Public Well being dedicates ample time to planning their wellness program to drive outcomes. 

“Every year, the coordinators take nice delight in planning their new program and including new components and actions to maintain contributors engaged,” Michelle says. “They closely promote and market their wellness program to all present workers and new hires as they arrive.”

Stephanie says planning is crucial to program success. 

“We do quite a lot of planning. We meet to go over campaigns. We even have a kickoff assembly originally of the 12 months, a check-in within the center, and planning within the fall,” she says.

RELATED: 15 Wellness Engagement Concepts to Construct a Tradition of Wellness

Enjoyable

The company additionally strives to make their program enjoyable for contributors – a key consider ongoing participation. This system even offers alternatives for workers’ spouses to take part, and in some circumstances, it’s required to earn all of the rewards factors. 

“We attempt to make it enjoyable. We survey employees to get their enter on what campaigns to do, as a result of we all know that getting buy-in from the staff is vital if we’re going to maintain this system rising,” Stephanie says. “No two years are guided across the identical subject material. We do attempt to make campaigns unfold varied pursuits. So, we survey and see what individuals are excited by and we attempt every year to satisfy their wants.”

Incentives

Lorain County Public Well being affords incentives for program participation, together with:

• HSA contributions for workers who’re on the insurance coverage plan
• Reward card raffle prizes for workers who aren’t on the insurance coverage plan
• Extra prizes for workers who’ve achieved their wellness objectives

“We really feel that it’s vital that, along with the present playing cards that WellSteps offers for campaigns, we additionally do further prizes for our groups,” Stephanie says. “On the finish of the 12 months, we’ll raffle off a Garmin watch for workers who reached their objectives, so we do have some massive prizes along with incomes HSA {dollars}.”

RELATED: 18 Wellness Program Incentive Concepts

Lowered Healthcare Prices

The HSA contributions can considerably scale back healthcare prices for its workers. That’s a direct and measurable profit, however even those that aren’t on the insurance coverage plan can scale back prices by adopting a more healthy life-style. 

“Participation not solely advantages you health-wise, it advantages you financially by incomes cash towards your medical insurance deductible,” Stephanie says. “With our program, you earn an excessive amount of wellness factors for preventive care, that are the appointments and actions you’d often full.”

RELATED: Influence of Worker Wellness Packages on Healthcare Prices

Why Lorain County Public Well being Selected WellSteps for its Wellness Program

Public companies have many wellness choices, and no two packages are alike. Stephanie says Lorain County Public Well being selected WellSteps for the excessive stage of help we provide.

“We like having unbiased representatives who work with us and are phenomenal with our employees,” she says. “We all know we aren’t Michelle and Caroline’s solely shoppers, however they make us really feel like we’re. We by no means really feel like we’re only a buyer shopping for a product. Our WellSteps representatives are invested in us, care about our staff, and worth our suggestions, and that speaks volumes about this system.”

Stephanie says a few of her favourite options are the app, challenges, and talent to customise this system to satisfy their wants.

“We actually like that there’s the app. We’re getting higher participation as a result of folks can do it on their telephones. We additionally just like the challenges, that’s one thing we see quite a lot of departments doing for his or her employees,” she says. “It may be one thing tailor-made to staff members’ pursuits. You’ll be able to cater this system to worker wants and skills, cater it to alter based mostly on how many individuals you’ve gotten. It will be a program that works whether or not you’ve gotten a big or small company. You’ll be able to actually go to WellSteps and ask them to create a program with the flexibility to edit as you want to.”

As this wellness case research illustrates, a program that caters to the assorted pursuits and wishes of a various employees can earn excessive participation ranges. This in flip fosters overarching objectives of higher worker well being and decreased healthcare prices.