Wellness Programs : What Health Vendors Are Not Telling You.

The organizations with the most cost-efficient medical programs are the ones that streamline the services personnel receive for both their physical and psychological health.

As a long-term goal, having your general health plan, worker assistance program (EAP) and wellness program communicating regularly with one another about employees’ treatments is the single best way to reduce redundant or contradictory treatments, eliminate unnecessary claims and improve the quality of the plans for which you pay.

Let’s look at the relationship between your health promotion program and your employee assistance program (EAP) to illustrate the importance of attacking healthcare costs cross a wide front.

You can begin a wellness program with a health risk assessment and then, if appropriate, roll out a use of tobacco cessation program or a weight loss program.

But ultimately you want to make sure that your wellness vendor works paired with your EAP vendor.

Here’s why -  It’s very common for an employee to contact the employee assistance program (EAP) because the person feels depressed about his or her weight. What you want is for the employee assistance program (EAP) vendor to treat the employee’s depression and behavioral issues, plus you want the employee assistance program (EAP) to refer the employee to the health promotion program to deal with the root cause of the problem - obesity.

The same thing accompanies the relationship your health promotion program and your workers’ comp provider, STD and LTD providers, rehab people , and/or disease managers. You want all them talking to - and sharing data with - each other. If they’re not, it’s costing you money.

In general, the businesss who achieve the greatest cost savings through their health promotion programs are the ones who overlap wellness with behavioral and occupational health issues.