Promising and Best Practices in Total Worker Health Workshop Summary (2014) / Chapter Skim
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5 Total Worker Health for Small- and Medium-Sized Businesses
5 Total Worker Health for Small- and Medium-Sized Businesses
Pages 37-46
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From page 37... ...
Although examples of truly integrated safety and wellness programs within smaller businesses were difficult to identify for the workshop, about half of all Americans work in settings with 500 or fewer employees. "We are a nation of small businesses," said Lee Newman, Professor, Colorado School of Public Health, and Chief Medical Information Officer, Axion Health, Inc.
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From page 38... ...
• Lee Newman, Professor, Colorado School of Public Health, and Chief Medical Information Officer, Axion Health, Inc. A Colo rado School of Public Health initiative, Health LinksTM1, is de veloping a healthy business certification and advising program in the state and which mostly serves businesses with fewer than 500 employees.
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From page 39... ...
READINESS Some businesses with fewer than 50 employees may consider themselves to be too small for a worksite wellness program or for integration of wellness and traditional safety programs, said Newman. His Colorado School of Public Health program works with small businesses on ways to translate research into practice around safety and health promotion, but the literature on small business applications "is sparse." A systematic review of published articles on the worksite wellness component for small businesses -- in terms of both adoption and effectiveness -- found fewer than 20 studies that met the reviewers' criteria for rigor (McCoy et al., 2014)
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From page 40... ...
HealthyU, the company's free medical clinic available to both workers and families, provides primary care, health coaching, and acute care, and helps people access health care. Each clinic appointment is a minimum of 15 minutes, so even when a presenting problem is quickly ad
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From page 41... ...
The framework allows them to determine which specific wellness and safety activities fit in their business framework and company culture. Employers currently offering no health and safety programs, Newman said, "may integrate
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From page 42... ...
Priorities may differ within the employee population, Nguyen said, with employees doing the "heavy lifting" preferring an emphasis on safety -- including improved building maintenance to reduce hazards -- with people in office jobs preferring wellness. Yet another group of workers might prefer that the monies spent on wellness be invested in higher wages or used to hire additional employees, in order to decrease the amount of mandatory overtime or ease productivity demands.
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From page 43... ...
For companies, the certification process begins with an online application that provides feedback, which is followed by an advising visit where project personnel discuss the safety and wellness profiles of the company, following the Total Worker Health model. The program includes an annual recertification, which focuses on continued improvements measured at the organizational level.
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From page 44... ...
Nguyen said there can be a conflict of interest, if reporting high rates of health problems would lead to a request for more vendor-supplied interventions. Also, in the reactors panel at the end of the workshop, Margaret Robbins, National Director, Occupational Safety and Health, Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions, said, management must ensure programs are truly voluntary, regardless of who is carrying them out, and voluntary in fact, not just by design, as coercive programs have engendered worker opposition.
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From page 45... ...
TOTAL WORKER HEALTH FOR SMALL- AND MEDIUM-SIZED BUSINESSES 45 can an employer credibly start talking to people about its concerns for their health.
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