Issue: September/October 2010
Best Places to Work: Best Remedy for Sick Time
Company: Community Health Partners
Location: Lorain
Number of Employees:
Approximately 2,200
What They Do: Faith-based provider of health care
in communities throughout Northeast Ohio
Why It’s a Great Place to Work:
Of 200 employees who signed up for Community Health Partners’ wellness
programs, 63 percent reached their health goals and used 98 fewer sick
days than the year before.
Community Health Partners employees take care of patients all day. So when they need to take care of themselves, they go to Valerie Watters.
The health management coordinator runs Community Health Partners’ disease management program.
She sends out mailings to employees asking if they want to work on their blood pressure, cholesterol or other health issues. “If they choose to do so, I coach them for 16 weeks,” she says. “I provide resources to help with whatever their issue may be.”
The program starts with standard biometric screening, lab work and weight measurement. Employees also have access to a dietician, an on-site fitness center and Fresh Start, a program to help them stop smoking. Of the 200 employees who signed up in 2009, 63 percent reached their health goals and used 98 fewer sick days than the year before.
Created to cut Community Health Partners’ health care costs, the program helped trim $4.3 million off the budget for associate health and prescription costs in 2009.
“Our employees are our biggest and best resource,” Watters says. “If they feel good, they do their job better and miss fewer days of work.”
Related Archive Article(s)
Popularity:This record has been viewed
1310 times.