Expanding Wellness: Employee Financial Wellness
As employee wellness becomes the rule and not the exception there’s an opportunity to have your program rise above the rest. Expanding wellness programs past just medical health and focusing on other aspects of employees’ lives, such as employee financial wellness, that can affect their health through stress and other factors can create a more holistic wellness picture. Financial education is a component that continues to enhance employee wellness programs across the country. Finances are a common stressor for employees regardless of their age or station and providing financial education and planning to employees can actually make employees healthier.
CVS Health Brand Exceeds Expectations
CVS/pharmacy posted a 10.3% increase in net revenue in the third quarter. As the economy continues to recover and the pharmacy sector continues to grow, positive returns shouldn't be surprising. However, the numbers CVS Health brand is putting up are almost unprecedented. A major reason for the growth came from the acquisition of Omnicare, which continues to prove the innovation of CVS/pharmacy. Omnicare allowed CVS/pharmacy to expand into the niche pharmacy market for senior living and long-term care facilities and provide care to a population who may never go into a retail pharmacy.
Employee Health Screenings: How Much Testing is Too Much?
As we enter the season of open enrollment employers are looking for ways to minimize health care costs and employees are already thinking about new years resolutions and how they can get healthy “after the holidays.” According to a Kaiser Family Foundation report, half of large employers in America require employees to submit to some time of biometric screening. However, it is important for employers to consider how required employee health screenings affect their relationship with employees. So what’s the risk? Employees are all adults, and they ultimately can choose when to go to the doctor. Some go to the doctor regularly, others choose to go less often. Still others might be generally healthy but don’t check in at the doctor’s office as much as they should. So requiring biometric screening can feel invasive and create the illusion of “forcing” employees to go to the doctor, potentially against their general practice.
Keep Hospital Readmission Rates Low Using Incentives
The care that a patient receives directly after leaving the hospital is critical to keeping hospital readmission rates low. It is estimated that nearly 20% of patients are readmitted to the hospital within 30 days of being discharged and about 75% of those readmissions are preventable. There are various factors as to why hospital readmission occur. Most often patients are not seeing their Primary Care Physician while they are in the hospital and their PCP is only receiving a summary of treatment instead of a complete diagnosis with follow-up care recommendations. Low-income readmissions can potentially lose hospitals money with the odds being higher that another hospital bill will go unpaid. In 2015, The Affordable Care Act has mandated a financial penalty of up to 3% for institutions that have not complied with standards for reducing readmission rates. Incentives can play a huge role in reducing readmission rates. They allow you to reward patients for taking small steps that make a big difference between a healthy recovery and another trip to the ER, whether it be following up with their Primary Care Physicians or adhering to their prescription medication. Download our free white paper Reducing Readmission Rates through Incentives and Education to learn more on how to use incentives to reduce that 20% readmissions rate. Learn more about:
