Great American Insurance Group is a believer about using incentives to promote employee health. This year, the Cincinnati-based company’s parent, American Financial Group, held a AFGreat Health Challenge in which it promised to give away a car and other prizes if at least 70 percent of employees participated in health screenings and if the company’s overall health scores improved compared to the previous year.
The incentive program was a success. More than 75 percent of the company’s 5,500 employees participated in some aspect of the six-month program. About half of the employees purchased pedometers that allowed them to upload their steps to a company Web site, track their progress and compete against each other in walking clubs.
On December 9, the company held a ceremony in which it awarded a 2009 Saturn Sky as a grand prize to a San Diego employee. It also gave away $10,000 and $5,000 shopping sprees, and a $2,500 gas card. Other finalists received Wii game systems.
Scott Beeken, AFG’s vice president for benefits strategy and planning, made the case for health promotion incentives both for health and productivity reasons and as a good financial move. “If a single at-risk employee can avoid a triple by-pass procedure, we’ll save as much as $75,000 and enable that person to remain a happy and healthy member of the Great American family for years to come. A $30,000 car seems like a pretty small price to pay for a payoff like that.”
During the program, health risk assessments showed more employees with good scores and fewer with poor scores compared to 2008. Employees who participated in the weight loss program lost an average of 18 pounds. Employees who participated in the walking program averaged more than 8,200 steps per day, about 2 miles more than the typical office worker walks per day. Screenings identified two employees with early stage cancers.
AFG’s health care costs this year have been holding steady. In fact, the company declared a health premium holiday for employees on several of the company’s health plans because of lower than expected costs.
Does OSHA need to “resurrect the process” for developing standards? Yes, says former NIOSH Director John Howard, M.D., J.D., who said in a world increasingly looking to the European Union for standards leadership, OSHA runs the risk of becoming “irrelevant.”
Howard, speaking at a symposium on “The Future of Occupational Safety and Health” sponsored by the International Safety Equipment Association, said the main issue contributing to the charge of irrelevance against OSHA is “the lack of connectivity between the current causes of worker injury, illness and death, and the absence of standards that address such causes.” more…
A safety consultant writes us: “I have a client that’s trying to convince all employees to stop wearing rings while working. Some employees are saying there are no facts and data to back up the ‘No Rings’ policy.” more…
I’ll be the first to admit that my relationship with regular exercise has been on-again, off-again at best. Obviously, I’m not alone. The Centers for Disease Control reports that more than 1 in 4 adults say they are obese, an increase of nearly 2 percent from 2005 to 2007. And to be honest, you had to go no further than the National Safety Congress last week to see how prevalent this problem is in our society. more…
Sandy
September 26th, 2008
A recent experience caused me to realize that EHS managers more and more frequently are becoming not just road warriors, but international road warriors, subjected to hours and even days spent traveling every week. I’m going to start this category off with my own road warrior story, but feel free to add your own comments and suggestions for ways to proactively utilize time spent in airports, train stations, taxis, etc., or, better yet, ways to get around recorded customer service messages to find a real person who can help.
I flew out to the National Safety Congress this year on a sunny Sunday morning, looking forward to landing just a couple of hours after I left – the benefit of east to west travel – and enjoying some relaxing hours by my hotel pool before the serious work started. I made the mistake of taking an airline I’ve heard nothing but complaints about and connecting in O’Hare, the nation’s second busiest airport. Recipe for disaster right? RIGHT! more…
Why would we change the name of a magazine – Occupational Hazards – that is celebrating its 70th anniversary in October? Well, we got the idea from you.
For the past 20 years (at least), we’ve been documenting the changes going on in the occupational safety and health field. Corporate staffs were slashed and the lines between various professional specialties started to blur as companies structured their programs around generalists. While their duties varied, many of them reported in our National Safety Survey that their responsibilities included safety, industrial hygiene, occupational health and environmental management. more…
