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The Wellness Compliance Checker was designed to help workplace wellness programs stay compliant with ERISA, HIPAA and GINA.

This is a compliance screening tool and should not be used as a substitute for qualified legal advice.

Please answer "Yes" or "No" as prompted.

Based on your answers, your wellness program may not be compliant with federal nondiscrimination laws. Here are things you can do to bring your program into compliance:

Make sure that group health plan enrollment, continued eligibility, and benefits (deductibles, premium or co-pays) are not based on the provision of genetic or family medical history information.

Make sure that wellness rewards or incentives are not based on the provision of genetic or family medical history information.

Things to Remember About GINA

1) If you request employees to complete a Health Risk Appraisal (HRA), you can be GINA compliant by using an HRA with no family medical history questions.

2) A health insurance company can require a genetic test to determine medical necessity for payment of a claim.

3) Group health plans can still reward participation in:

An annual physical,

Preventive services, or

Disease management or prevention programs

It is best if these programs are all available to all employees.

Based on how you answered previous questions, you may not be compliant with some federal nondiscrimination laws. Here are some things you could do to ensure that you are compliant:

Base rewards on participation in your wellness program and not on health screening data, personal medical history, or addictive behaviors. For example, you can base a reward on participation in a blood pressure screening rather than on blood pressure values.

Make sure that wellness rewards or incentives are not tied to either health plan eligibility (e.g. enrollment, effective date, or waiting period), or benefits (e.g. premiums, deductibles, co-pays, co-insurance or surcharges). Rewards such as gift cards or paid days off are good examples of rewards that are NOT tied to the health plan.

NOTE: More advanced wellness programs may base rewards on health screening data or may tie these data to health plan benefits. These are called "outcomes-based" or "health-contingent" wellness programs and are legal if you follow the rules. We will help you understand these rules in a few steps.
Congratulations!

Your wellness program is compliant with federal nondiscrimination provisions.

To further help you in your efforts, here is some specific language recommended to explain alternative programming options for those who are unable to participate for whatever reason.

"Rewards for participating in the wellness program are available to all employees. If you feel that you cannot meet a standard for a reward under the wellness program, you may still be able to earn the same reward. Contact us at [insert contact information] and we will work with you to modify the wellness program.
OR
If it is unreasonably difficult due to a medical condition for you to achieve the standards for the reward under this program, call us at[insert contact information] and we will work with you to develop another way to qualify for the reward."

You are not in compliance with the federal nondiscrimination provisions. You can bring your program into compliance by making the changes necessary to enable you to answer, "Yes" to the following questions:

Contact us to learn how WellSteps wellness solutions can help you improve employee health.

Congratulations!

You're done and it appears your program is in compliance with federal nondiscrimination laws.

Congratulations!

You're done and it appears you're in compliance with federal nondiscrimination laws.

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The Wellness Compliance Checker was designed to help workplace wellness programs stay compliant with ERISA, HIPAA and GINA. This is a compliance screening tool and should not be used as a substitute for qualified legal advice. Please answer "Yes" or "No" as prompted.

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As companies increasingly face rising health costs and competition, comprehensive workplace health programs are becoming more widely used as a strategy for impacting employee health and productivity and, in turn, corporate bottom lines.

Comprehensive workplace health programs aim to reach employees through a variety of ways, including workplace policies, benefits, environmental changes, and programs and services available for employees, spouses, and dependents.

However, each company and its employees is unique and the strategies used to address employee health will vary from company to company based on the resources available, needs and interests of management and employees, and health issues that are priorities.

A key question for wellness coordinators to ask is: How do you know which workplace health strategies will be most valuable for your particular company to implement?

Developing a comprehensive employee workplace health program, or making improvements to an existing one, requires an understanding of what impacts the health of employees at the worksite.

What is workplace health assessment

A workplace health assessment is a process of gathering information about the factors that support and/or hinder the health of employees at a particular workplace and identifying potential opportunities to improve or address them

A workplace health assessment helps to identify the current picture of health at a company as well as ways to improve it that can potentially increase productivity, decrease absenteeism, and control health care costs for both employees and the organization as a whole

It is a necessary first step before goals are developed, resources allocated, strategies adopted and interventions implemented, employees participate, and outcomes are measured

Factors influencing workplace health1, 2

Many factors influence health in the workplace and can be impacted by supportive changes within the following levels of influence:

Individual - elements of an employee's health, such as their health behaviors, health risk factors such as high blood pressure, and current health status

Interpersonal - elements of an employee's social network including relationships with managers, coworkers, and family that provide support; mentoring or role models

Organizational - elements of the workplace structure, culture, practices and policies such as benefits, health promotion programs, work organization, and leadership and management support for workplace health and safety initiatives

Environmental - elements of the physical workplace such as facilities and settings where employees work as well as access and opportunities for health promotion provided by the surrounding community where employees live

How to conduct workplace health assessment

A workplace health assessment involves learning about a workplace and the health of its employees. Employee health is determined by a complex set of interactions between the individual and their social, cultural, and physical environments and can be influenced in many ways. It is important to assess employee health from a number of perspectives using multiple sources of data to gain a more complete picture of the determinants of health. For example, reviewing health care costs will provide information on which health conditions are the biggest contributors to the total, but do not provide insight into what factors contribute to those conditions.

The types of data sources that will be available will depend on the workplace. Some data is readily available, other data may need to be requested from a third party, and some may not be currently available requiring a decision whether to collect it or not. The types of data sources used to gather information in a workplace health assessment may include:

Site visits
Site visits are in person observations of the workplace setting and includes interviews with managers and employees to discuss health attitudes and beliefs; and review health promotion programs and policies; and evaluate the worksite environment for health risks

Employee surveys
Examples ofemployee surveys include Health Risk Appraisals; employee satisfaction and interest surveys; safety surveys and routine inspections

Health benefits
The type ofcoverage and covered services employee receive under the health plan; vacation and sick time; access to health promotion programs

Health care and pharmaceutical claims
A source for identifying the common health conditions and procedures for which employees are seekinghealth care and their costs

Other data sources
Examples includetime and attendance; injury; and participation in, satisfaction with, or outcomes from other employee health programs

Other data sources may also provide information that will be useful for designing and evaluating a workplace health program. Such data sources include data on injury prevalence, causes and workers compensation; absenteeism; use of existing health programs such as EAP or fitness facilities. A possible list of data sources is provided in table below.

Other Additional Sources of Data Relevant to Worksite Health

Number of injuries, percentage of employees with injuries, cost of injuries, days lost by types of injuries, time to return to work

By worksite
By unit

Site Database
OHSA template

Use of EAP

Number of employees and number of sessions and cost by presenting problem

By worksite By unit

EAP Vendor Activity Summary

Job Satisfaction

Ratings of Job Satisfaction, Communication, and Support

By worksite By unit

Employee Engagement Survey

Tools and Resources

Key questions

Overall, a workplace health assessment can help make connections between the various types of risk factors affecting employee health at the individual, intrapersonal, organizational, and environmental levels that are supported through multiple pieces of data. It will help develop a deeper profile of what is going on at a workplace to help inform a workplace health improvement plan for initiating a workplace health program or making enhancements to an existing program. The key questions a workplace health assessment can help answer are:

What are the key health issues affecting employees?

What factors at the worksite influence employee health?

What are the employees' health and safety concerns?

What strategies are most appropriate to address these health issues?

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Work@Health® is an employer-based training program. The ultimate aim of the program is to improve the organizational health of participating employers and certified trainers, with an emphasis on strategies to reduce chronic disease and injury risk to employees and an eye to improving overall worker productivity.

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Notes to self

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Work@Health® is an employer-based training program. The ultimate aim of the program is to improve the organizational health of participating employers and certified trainers, with an emphasis on strategies to reduce chronic disease and injury risk to employees and an eye to improving overall worker productivity.

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CDC Workplace Health Resource Center | Initiatives | Workplace Health Promotion | CDC

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Work@Health® is an employer-based training program. The ultimate aim of the program is to improve the organizational health of participating employers and certified trainers, with an emphasis on strategies to reduce chronic disease and injury risk to employees and an eye to improving overall worker productivity.

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780 Culture and Worksite Evaluationculture)

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recipe for engagement

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Survey Design and Implementation Course
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention http://www.cdc.gov/prc/training/trainings/survey-design-implementation.htm

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engagement

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Conceptualizing Wellbeing in the Workplace

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https://screencast-o-matic.com/watch/cq6enxuIdH

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The CDC National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health's (NIOSH) Quality of Worklife Questionnaire provides 76 questions on a wide range of work organization, work/life balance, and worker well-being issues.

Health Risk Appraisals at the Worksite: Basics for HRA Decision Making pdf icon [PDF-2.3M] external icon is a guide developed by the National Business Coalition on Health in collaboration with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the selection and use of health risk appraisals in the workplace available for employers.

CDC has developed a vaccine questionnaire that can be used by employees to determine whether they need to discuss vaccines with their physicians.

CDC Worksite Health Scorecard Developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Health Scorecard is a tool designed to help employers assess the extent to which they have implemented evidence-based health promotion interventions or strategies in their worksites to prevent heart disease, stroke, and related conditions such as hypertension, diabetes, and obesity.

NHWP Employee Level Assessments

NHWP Employee Health Assessment (CAPTURE™)pdf icon [PDF-957K]
Developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for use in the National Healthy Worksite Program, is a tool to assess employee health status, health behaviors, readiness to change, needs and interests related to worksite health and safety, and work-related health history.

NHWP Health and Safety Climate Survey (INPUTS™)pdf icon [PDF-857K]
Developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for use in the National Healthy Worksite Program, is a tool to assess employee perceptions of the work environment, working conditions, and the attitudes of supervisors and coworkers that support a healthy worksite culture.

NHWP Health and Safety Climate Survey (INPUTS™) Manualpdf icon [PDF-1M]
Developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for use in the National Healthy Worksite Program, the user manual discusses how to administer and score the Health and Safety Climate Survey.

NOTE: There are important ethical considerations regarding protections of confidentiality, civil rights, and rights of the medically disabled when conducting employee surveys. These concerns require careful planning on the part of survey administrators to protect the rights and safety of all participants. Below are a few recommended guidelines.

1. Establish procedures to protect the confidentiality and privacy of employees. This is very important for avoiding the perception or fear of harassment, discrimination or retribution directed towards those employees who may express unfavorable responses.

2. Collect surveys anonymously, making sure that participants cannot be identified when they turn in their completed survey.

Instruct employees NOT to put their names on the survey form.

Do not allow supervisors to collect survey forms from subordinates.

Appoint a survey administrator (preferably someone external to the organization) to distribute and collect the surveys.

Provide envelopes for returning paper surveys to shield responses. If allowing "drop offs" (e.g., for off-shift employees), provide a locked container or other secure holding arrangement so that survey responses cannot be seen by other employees.

Establish privacy procedures to prevent web-based survey responses from being traced back to the participants. This involves changing the settings of the software to NOT collect e-mail and IP addresses of participants.

Consider omitting demographic questions, particularly if the organization is small or medium sized. This can help assure privacy of individuals when results are analyzed.

Protect privacy during data management.

Limit access to the survey data to a trusted data analyst, preferably someone external to the organization.

Be sure that data are captured and stored as de-identified. De-identified data (without e-mail or computer or work unit identifiers) can be downloaded into an excel spreadsheet.

Establish procedures to prevent unauthorized access to the data.

Protect privacy during reporting of results.

Individual employee responses can easily be identified when reporting results for small groups, even if unintended; this is especially true in small and medium sized organizations. For this reason, AVOID reporting results by work unit, location, or any demographic category (e.g., age groups, gender, race, etc.) unless there is a minimum of 25 employees in each category.

If your organization has 25 or more employees and you would like to perform comparisons between work units, locations, or employee characteristics, the following is a list of demographic questionspdf icon [PDF-725K] that you may consider using.

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Work@Health® is an employer-based training program. The ultimate aim of the program is to improve the organizational health of participating employers and certified trainers, with an emphasis on strategies to reduce chronic disease and injury risk to employees and an eye to improving overall worker productivity.

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Positive health behaviors such as, adequate sleep, being physically active and good nutritional habits can all have an impact on employee engagement and workplace behaviors. Engaged employees find personal meaning in their work. “They believe that their organizations value them and, in return, engaged employees are more likely to go above the minimum and expend ‘discretionary effort’ to deliver performance,” (Lavigna, 2013, p. 3.) The emotional and behavioral connections that can be created from being part of an organization engages its employees.

Which workplace factors have the biggest impact on employee engagement?

No employer can ensure well-being in all aspects of an employee’s life, but an increase in personnel engagement at work can elevate an employee’s overall well-being.

References

Lavigna, Robert (2013). Engaging Government Employees, AMACOM, p. 3.

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I initially wanted to do my capstone focusing on international trends in worksite wellness. Upon further evaluation I have decided to refocus on employee engagement.

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Value Drivers for Workplace

Wellness

1.What is Worksite Wellness?

a. Health Related Programs

Opportunities available to employees at the workplace or through outside                           organizations to begin, change, or maintain health behaviors.

b. Health Related Policies

Formal or informal written statements that are designed to protect or promote employee health. They affect large groups of employees simultaneously.

c. Heath Benefits

Part of an overall compensation package including health insurance coverage and other services or discounts regarding health.

d. Environmental Support

Physical factors at and nearby the workplace that help protect and enhance                   employee health.

2.Why is Wellness important?

a.  Positive mental and physical health frequently increase job satisfaction

b. Reduction in stress is correlated to reduced absenteeism

3.How Wellness Benefits the Organization.

a. Improvement of Employee Health

b.     Reduce Healthcare Cost

c.     Increase Productivity

d.     Positive Returns

CDC ( n.d.) Workplace Health Program Definition and Description – CDC , Retrieved  from                    https://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/pdf/Workplace-Health-Program-  Definition-and-Description.pdf

Institute for Health and Productivity Studies Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. (2015). Retrieved from https://www.transamericacenterforhealthstudies.org/docs/default-        source/wellness-page/from-evidence-to-practice---workplace-wellness-that      works.pdf?sfvrsn=2 (Links to an external site.)

Willis Towers Watson (2016). Improving workforce health and productivity: Connecting the       elements of workplace culture. Retrieved from            https://www.willistowerswatson.com/en/insights/2016/04/2015-2016-staying-at-work        united-states-research-findings

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Scorecards

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780 Lesson 1 Learning ResourcesDefinition of Workplace WellnessBest practice in Worksite Wellness is joining in collaboration, with employees, to assist your target audience with moving in a direction toward positive goals using research based supported practices.I found it interesting that in workplace health program’s definition and description of workplace description it included the phrasing “protection strategies,” I had never thought of wellness in those terms.Robinson (2013) reports on the increase of engagement and correlation to engagement on all levels of employees and management.ReferencesWorkplace health program definition and description. Retrieved from	https://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/pdf/workplace-health-program	definition-and-description.pdfRobinson, J. (2013, March 19). How to create a culture of organizational	wellbeing. Business Journal. Retreived	from http://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/159080/create-culture-organizational	wellbeing.aspx

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780 Lesson 1 Learning ResourcesDefinition of Workplace WellnessBest practice in Worksite Wellness is joining in collaboration, with employees, to assist your target audience with moving in a direction toward positive goals using research based supported practices.I found it interesting that in workplace health program’s definition and description of workplace description it included the phrasing “protection strategies,” I had never thought of wellness in those terms.Robinson (2013) reports on the increase of engagement and correlation to engagement on all levels of employees and management.ReferencesWorkplace health program definition and description. Retrieved from	https://www.cdc.gov/workplacehealthpromotion/pdf/workplace-health-program	definition-and-description.pdfRobinson, J. (2013, March 19). How to create a culture of organizational	wellbeing. Business Journal. Retreived	from http://news.gallup.com/businessjournal/159080/create-culture-organizational	wellbeing.aspx