2015 Conference

One Year Later: Our Progress in Moving Beyond Wellness to a Medical Home

Summary
Last year, Karen and Karen presented ?Beyond Wellness into a Medical Home.? At that time our Paladina Clinics had only been opened for about 2 months. The session focused on employee engagement and interest since it was too early to create analytics that could measure whether the clinics were actually saving the City of Arvada money. Now that the clinics have been opened for over?a year, the team has been able to start gathering statistics that speak to the cost-savings and efficiencies of the clinics.

In this session, attendees will see the savings that the City of Arvada has experienced by redirecting claims through the Paladina Clinics. There will also be a focus on the health results for employees and how the City is using this program to attract and retain quality employees in an increasingly competitive job market.

 

Karen Smiddy
Benefits Specialist, City of Arvada

Karen Smiddy has worked in the Human Resources field for more than 20 years. She feels fortunate to have worked at the City of Arvada for 16 years, and in her current position for 10 years. A proud Colorado native, Karen attended the University of Colorado at Denver and Metro State College. She enjoys gardening, hiking, and hanging out with her three grandkids.

 

Karen Hjerleid
Vice President of National Business Development, Paladina Health

Karen Hjerleid brings more than 20 years of experience as a business development and account management professional in both corporate and entrepreneurial settings. In Karen?s previous role at Rocky Mountain Health Plans, she launched a new sales division and grew it into the company?s most profitable line of business. She has held senior leadership roles at QualMed Plans for Health of Colorado and New Mexico, a managed care organization, McKinley Marketing Partners, a marketing consulting firm, InteliStaf Healthcare, a national staffing company, and Kelly Assisted Living Services, a home healthcare company. Karen also was involved in several successful start-up and turn-around initiatives.

Karen holds an MBA from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and a BS in Business Administration with honors from Colorado State University at Pueblo. Karen is co-founder of the Colorado Managed Care Workgroup and a member and past board member of the Colorado Gerontological Society and the Colorado Women?s Forum in Healthcare Administration.

Karen enjoys the Colorado lifestyle, playing with her dog (a very active Weimaraner), travel, dance and theatre.

Six-State Quitline Outcomes for Smokers with Behavioral Health Conditions and Limitations

Summary
Several demographic groups that are disproportionately impacted by smoking and also have a difficult time in successfully quitting tobacco use include those with known behavioral health issues.?? Over the past decade there has been a dramatic increase in the number of quitline callers with behavioral health issues, currently representing about half of all callers to our quitline.

National Jewish Health launched a year-long survey of callers to several of our state public quitlines based on recommendations by the North American Quitline Consortium?s (NAQC) Behavioral Health Advisory Forum?s Background Report (2010).

Data from 4,960 completed follow-up interviews were used to examine quit rates at 3- and 6-months. Among callers with behavioral health issues, those who reported a belief that these issues may interfere with their ability to quit using tobacco were significantly less likely to report no tobacco use in the past 30 days than callers who did not believe that their behavioral health issues could interfere.

Telephone quitlines serve segments of the population that are typically harder to reach, the uninsured, lower SES and lower education level. This study demonstrates in a real work example how adults with behavioral health issues are using tobacco quitlines. These data show that the quitline community is seeing even a higher prevalence of adults with behavioral health issues than reported by the CDC earlier this year (MMRW, 2013).

This real world sample of individuals with behavioral health issues and outcomes have important implications for further investigation and possible modification of treatment of adults with behavioral health issue through quitlines.

 

Amy V. Lukowski, Psy.D.
Clinical Director, Health Initiatives Programs, National Jewish Health?

Amy Lukowski serves as Clinical Director for Health Initiatives and Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Department of Medicine at National Jewish Health and Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado Denver, School of Medicine. She is a licensed psychologist, Tobacco Treatment Specialist (TTS) and a MINT (Motivational Interviewing Network of Trainers) trainer. She has expertise in working clinically with both individual patients and populations in overcoming dependence and creating health behavior change in the areas of tobacco cessation and weight management. Currently, she is responsible for the clinical leadership, staff training, aiding and monitoring the development and assessment of the program?s clinical quality assurance and quality improvement programs. She also serves as key member of senior management team and is involved with all aspects of the planning, budgeting processes, operational oversight and client relations.

Dr. Lukowski received her Bachelor of Science degree in Psychology in 1995 and her Master of Science degree in Counseling in 1997 from the University of Wyoming. She received her Doctor of Psychology degree from the University of Northern Colorado in 2004, and completed her pre-doctoral internship at Creighton University. She is an active member of the Colorado Psychological Association, American Psychological Association, and serves on the Board of Directors of the North American Quitline Consortium (NAQC).

Taking Care of Business: Supporting Families to Prevent Child Maltreatment-The Business Sectors Role

Summary
Child maltreatment is a significant public health problem in Colorado with long term effects on physical and mental health. Children who experience adverse events, such as child maltreatment, are at increased risk for health problems later in life, such as depression, substance abuse, obesity and chronic diseases.

Research shows that children at risk for child maltreatment are part of families experiencing economic stress, limited social supports, and lack coping skills. Losing benefits like child care or other work supports often far exceeds wage increases which further stresses families. Creating family supportive policies in businesses and communities leads to safer, more stable relationships and environments where kids thrive and parents are successful.

In 2013 Colorado was one of only five states to be awarded federal funding for an initiative to promote safe, stable, and nurturing relationships and environments for children in order to protect them from child maltreatment. Partners across multiple sectors came together utilizing a collective impact approach to guide this initiative?s vision and strategy for improving the lives of children and families in our state. After a thorough process to determine the landscape in Colorado with regard to the environments where children live, learn and play, stakeholders convened to determine the strategic plan for moving forward. Three key strategies were identified in this plan: Meet the needs for all families to access childcare, preschool and kindergarten; Increase family friendly business practices in Colorado; Advance policy and community approaches to improve mental health.

Colorado business leaders are committed to creating a socially responsible business model and understand that work is a second home-and that personal and professional life is interconnected. Research bears this out. We know that employees who work in environments that support family friendly practices are more productive, miss work less, and are overall more committed to their employer which supports sustainable businesses. When businesses invest in families, they invest in children- which is vital to helping children start down the path toward school success and productive adulthood. These investments also promote the building of vibrant communities.

 

Shannon Breitzman
Branch Chief for the Violence and Injury Prevention-Mental Health Promotion Branch, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE)

As the Branch Chief for the Violence and Injury Prevention?Mental Health Promotion Branch at the CDPHE, Shannon supports several priority injury and violence prevention initiatives, as well as mental health promotion and substance abuse prevention initiatives, including: Suicide Prevention, Prescription Drug Overdose Prevention, Motor Vehicle Safety, Older Adult Falls Prevention, Child Maltreatment Prevention, Interpersonal and Sexual Violence Prevention, Colorado Child Fatality Prevention System, and Retail Marijuana Education and Prevention. Programs within the branch aim to reduce injury and violence, and promote mental health through injury surveillance, policy development and implementation, public awareness and education, community grant making, technical assistance and training, needs assessments and evaluation. Shannon serves as the principal investigator for the CDC funded Essentials for Childhood Grant, which is a collective impact effort for the primary prevention of child maltreatment.

Shannon has a Masters degree in Child and Family Therapy and has worked with children and families for twenty-one years, including fifteen years in public health.

The Value of Happiness: Creating a Culture of Happiness and Wellbeing at Work

Summary
A conversation about ?Whole Health? would be remiss and incomplete without a discussion on the importance of happiness! Yes. That?s right. Happiness! The topic of ?happiness? and exploring ways to create work cultures that embrace and value happiness needs to be a vital part of companies? wellness initiatives if they truly desire to create a work environment that celebrates ?Whole Health?.

Research is showing us that happiness is a core component of health and wellness. We are beginning to understand the importance of embracing the idea that a happier person is a healthier person?and, in turn, a healthier person is a happier person. As one article stated, ?health has come to be viewed in a more holistic way, with both mind and body taken into account, happiness has been getting folded into the idea of ?health and wellness.?

Many scientific studies, including those by Dr. Laura Kubzansky and other researchers at Harvard School of Public Health have found a significant link between psychological and physical well-being. In a review of more than 200 studies, the Harvard researchers found a connection between positive psychological attributes, such as happiness, optimism and life satisfaction, and a lowered risk of cardiovascular disease.

Equally compelling is what Carol Graham, researcher and author of The Pursuit of Happiness: An Economy of Well-Being, shares; the observation that health correlates more strongly with happiness than any other variable included?even income?in countries throughout the world. Happiness surveys, Graham shows us, are powerful tools that members of the health policy community can use to gain fresh perspectives on the public?s health behavior and to develop policy worldwide.

Shawn Achor, founder and CEO of Good Think, Inc., published his 2010 ground-breaking book, The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work. In his words, ?It?s important to organizations for employees to be happy, and not just for the employees themselves. The greatest competitive advantage in the modern economy is a positive and engaged workforce,?

We believe that exploring the topic of how to create a culture of happiness and well being is timely and relevant. It?s spot on when the conference audience is made of individuals who are invested and dedicated to creating work environments that engage their employees and support whole health initiatives.

 

Laura Saye, LMFT, CACIII, CDWF-Candidate
Owner, ?Whole Hearted Living?

Laura Saye is a Licensed Marriage, Family Therapist and Organization Development Specialist. She received her BA in Liberal Arts from Antioch University and her MA in Marriage Family Therapy from Phillips Graduate Institute. She has over 25 years of experience working with organizations such as Kaiser Permanente and the State of Colorado providing leadership and team development consultation and training, and with individuals, couples, families and leaders to increase happiness, hopefulness and resilience in their lives.

Ms. Saye has earned multiple certifications:

• Addictions Counselor
• EMDR for the treatment of trauma
• Myers-Briggs Type Inventory (MBTI)
• Emotional Quotient Inventory (EQ-i)
• Multiple Franklin Covey trainings
• The Daring Way? a methodology based on the cutting edge research of Dr. Bren? Brown on vulnerability, courage, shame and worthiness

Equally as important, Laura is a wife, mother, sister, daughter, caregiver, friend, dog and guinea pig lover. She is passionate about yoga, gardening, camping, sailing, soap making and all things crafty

Laura is currently in private practice located in the Lowry area in Denver, Colorado.

 

Marcia Kent
President, BizPsych

Marcia Kent, MS, currently serves as the President of BizPysch, a division of Mines and Associates (MINES). She has received outstanding reviews as a senior trainer and organizational psychology specialist at MINES. She has been described as results-oriented, motivated and passionate about her work as an organizational psychology specialist and is in high demand for her services. Her diverse business experience includes work as an executive coach, business consultant, corporate trainer, and organizational development specialist for over eighty client companies.

Extreme Makeover: Worksite Wellness Edition

Summary
Worksite wellness is under great scrutiny. The RAND Report, healthcare blogs, industry leaders and more have called into question the approach and efficacy of most worksite wellness programs. Up until now, the standard protocol has been to 1) assess each participating employee and uncover biomedical risk factors, 2) give feedback to each participant based on that limited scope and 3) link each participant to the appropriate lifestyle/disease management program ? with lots of incentives along the way. The problem is that this approach is yielding mediocre results at best. It?s time for an extreme makeover to move away from health risk reduction to creating a thriving culture ? one that frees, fuels and inspires people to bring their best to work.

 

Rosie Ward, PhD, MPH, MCHES, BCC, CIC?, CVS-FR

Dr. Rosie Ward is a consultant, professional coach and author known as a thought leader who challenges the status quo, pushes boundaries and engages people and organizations to find success through shifting old, ineffective thinking habits. She has a diverse background with over 20 years of experience promoting wellbeing, employee engagement, and transforming organizations in various settings.

Dr. Ward serves as the Director of Health Coaching Education for Fairview Physician Associates in Minneapolis where she oversees bringing a people-centric approach to supporting individual well-being and develops physicians to think differently and provide better care. She is also an owner of Salveo Partners where she consults with organizations, blending the worlds of Organizational Development and employee wellbeing to provide a unique approach to create thriving workplace cultures that free, fuel and inspire people to bring their best selves to work.

Dr. Ward has degrees in kinesiology, public health and a Ph.D. in Organization and Management where her research focused on organizational culture, intrinsic motivation and coaching. Dr. Ward is regularly interviewed for business publications, is a contributing author to?the book?Organization Development in Healthcare: High Impact Practices for a Complex and Changing Environment and co-author of the book How to Build a Thriving Culture at Work: Featuring the 7 Points of Transformation with business partner Dr. Jon Robison, published November 2014.

 

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Addressing the #1 Cause of Employee Stress: Financial Wellness

Summary
Financial stress is regarded as the number one cause of stress in the workplace. The impacts arrive from health care costs, day care for families, saving for an emergency fund, maintaining vehicles, and desire to save for retirement or college for children. Learn about a curriculum of workshops to address the diverse needs of your employees and their families.
Understanding the needs of your employees and addressing through education in the worksite will improve productivity, engagement with others, and greater overall results for your business!

Dan Morris
Financial Services Professional, New York Life

Dan Morris has been an entrepreneur for more than 25 years and has held various positions of business leadership in companies, including ownership. I work together with my team of professionals to offer comprehensive solutions for the dynamic planning needs of businesses.

 

Mike Stahl
Financial Services Professional, High Point Financial Group

Mike Stahl provides individuals and families with the knowledge to help them achieve their goals and dreams. He works with each client to help them identify, prioritize and most importantly implement their goals. Mike takes great pride in knowing that he plays a key role in working together with our clients to build and protect their financial future.

A brief synopsis of the work that we do:

• We are committed to serving our community through financial education, to assure individuals, business owners, and organizations have choices to protect them.
• Work directly with Human Resource Managers of organizations with employee retention solutions through services, products, and financial wellness workshops.
• Work closely with business owners to address the benefit needs of their company, buy/sell funding sources, and deferred compensation strategies.
• Instruct seminars on planned giving for non-profits to help assure financial sustainability for the organization while prioritizing the financial needs and desires of the donors.
• Passionate about the difference we are making in the community.

 

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Sleep Deprivation: Plaguing the Nation?s Workforce

Summary
Sleep problems have become one of America?s most common and troublesome medical issues. Nationwide polls conducted by the National Sleep Foundation consistently find that between 65 and 80% of Americans report experiencing at least one sleep disorder symptom at least one time per week. Similar studies on the sleep habits of working Americans purport that nearly a third of the population say they are getting a good night?s sleep only a few nights per month, and that daytime sleepiness negatively impacts more than one-fourth of American workers over the course of their workday. According to the National Sleep Foundation?s Darrel Drobnic, ?The effect of sleep loss on work performance is costing U.S. employers tens of billions of dollars a year in lost productivity. It?s time for American workers and employers to make sleep a priority? (2008).

With sleep disorders becoming the norm rather than the exception, it is imperative for workplaces and wellness programs to address this impending epidemic. The common effects of poor sleep can accrue slowly over time, resulting in long-lasting changes to one?s ability to think and function. These effects include exhaustion and increased ?sleep drive?, decreased executive function and cognitive ability, metabolic disruption, increased cardiovascular stress response, and increased emotional lability. Such problems can then increase the risk of accidents and other serious illness as well as decrease productivity in the workplace, representing a real threat to the safety and success of companies nationwide.

The presenter will begin by addressing the current sleep deprivation epidemic, the science behind it, and its direct relation to the workplace. The presentation will provide a primer on some of the most common causes of decreased sleep and/or rest, including occupational sleep deprivation, insomnia, and obstructive sleep apnea, and today?s most effective treatments accordingly. In addition, the presentation will focus on the role of employee wellness programs in reversing this negative trend of a sleep deprived workplace. It will emphasize the importance of workplace sleep initiatives and processes developed by Peer Assistance Services? Workplace Prevention Program (funded by a contract from the Colorado Office of Behavioral Health).

 

Christopher E. Knoepke, MSW, LCSW, ABD, CEAP
Employee Assistance/Workplace Programs Coordinator
Peer Assistance Services, Inc.

Chris Knoepke has been a Workplace Programs Coordinator at Peer Assistance Services since May of 2010, providing comprehensive Employee Assistance Programming to small and midsize businesses in Colorado under a contract with the Colorado Office of Behavioral Health. He is also the President of the Colorado Chapter of the Employee Assistance Professionals Association (EAPA) and a member of the Adjunct Faculty at the Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Denver, where he teaches courses in healthcare and substance abuse policy as well as clinical practice in the MSW program. Chris? prior research and clinical experience include behavioral sleep medicine, tobacco cessation, and child safety programming.

Chris has a BA in Psychology from Monmouth College, his Masters in Social Work from Washington University in St. Louis, and is a Predoctoral Fellow at the University of Denver?s Graduate School of Social Work and the University of Colorado?s Health Outcomes Program, where his dissertation is investigating means by which to improve quality of life among people being treated with cardiac devices.

Brussels + Muscles by Be Colorado Healthy Kids = Healthy Adults

Summary
This session will guide employers through the reasons why an employer would develop and incur the cost of a childrens wellness program. It will also outline unique marketing techniques which empower kids and parents alike to build positive lifelong habits-powered by fun!

 

Tony DeCrosta

Tony DeCrosta is the Chief Plan Administrator for the University of Colorado Health and Welfare Trust as well as its outreach organization, Be Colorado (becolorado.org). He is a versatile and effective leader with a deep understanding of organizations and their operations. He is responsible for the overall plan administration of a $320 million dollar integrated health and wellness plan that encompasses over 60,000 members spanning multiple employers, including: the University of Colorado, UCHealth and University Physicians, Inc. His optimistic and broad business perspective helped lead his team to create and develop new innovative products, including the nation’s only employer-sponsored dependent childrens program, Brussels+Muscles, (brusselsandmuscles.org).

Previously, he was the Chief Human Resource Officer at Colorado State University, overseeing all aspects of Human Resources including all of the self-funded health and welfare plans.

Prior to joining higher education, he spent 15 years in Fortune 500 companies where he held various senior-level positions overseeing health and welfare plans, pension trusts and labor relations. DeCrosta holds a Bachelor?s degree in Business Administration from the University System of New Hampshire, and a Masters of Business Administration from Colorado State University.

Creating a Culture of Health within a Dispersed, Well Compensated and Skilled Labor Workforce

Summary
This presentation will highlight a case study of an oil & gas company that has worked diligently over the past four years to promote a culture of health and wellbeing. This demographic is traditionally a more challenging group to engage into wellness program based on their remote locations and job demands. Through a developed strategy and consistent messaging, this company has been able to overcome these potential barriers and successfully create a foundation of strong engagement which will lead to long-term success.

Originating from a clear desire to focus on the health in addition to the safety of their employees from the executive team, the company has continued to expand their offerings of resources to help empower employees to improve their health. Initially the program began with screenings through the health insurance carrier, which has now expanded to a comprehensive program that has a targeted communication campaign around their wellbeing related efforts. Quarterly meetings exist among all vendor partners, including the wellness vendor, the high cost claimant management vendor, the third party administrator, the charity partner, their insurance broker and key internal personnel. As a result of the vendor party integration a more integrated and streamlined approach has been developed to deliver a cohesive voice to the employees around wellbeing.

In the most recent enrollment period, nearly two-thirds of their employees participated in a health screening and health assessment. Even more impressive is that 62% of their population completed all components of the program over the course of the wellness program year, indicating a high sustained engagement among their employees. Through a clearly articulated benefits strategy where the client has progressed to an unbundled self-funded approach supplemented by a wellness focus, the annual PEPM cost has reduced from $1,037 in 2009 to $861 in 2014 (based on numbers to date in 2014). This session will explore the above stated efforts of the company and others they have taken to create a culture where participation in the health program is becoming the norm, all the way from the employees in the corporate offices to those in the field.

 

Lise Kafka, MS, MPH
Account Executive, Health Risk Management, IMA, Inc

Lise Kafka serves as an Account Executive within IMA?s health risk management department, Life IQ. In this role she partners with the IMA employee benefits department and the client to develop strategic interventions that promote the health and wellbeing of employees.

Lise has nearly ten years of experience in the health and wellness industry. She has worked with employer groups across all industries, many of which have award-winning wellness programs. Prior to IMA, Lise has worked at a health management vendor, an educational institution and an onsite corporate fitness management vendor. In her various positions, Lise developed and implemented interventions including medical self-care, health-based policy change, managerial education, behavior change programs and value-based benefits designs.
Lise received her bachelor?s degree from Colorado College, an MS in sport psychology from Florida State University and an MPH in health promotion from Oregon State University. In her free time she enjoys bowling, hiking with her husband, and traveling.

 

Co-Presenter
Kathryn Hobbs
DCP Midstream

Legal Pitfalls Associated with Wellness Programs

Summary
This presentation will review the current status of regulations surrounding employer health and wellness benefits. Particular emphasis will be given to describing privacy security rules, ADA violations, and failure to provide a reasonable alternative standard. Ryan will provide three legal cases to go over which will help employers understand the importance of legal compliance in plan design.

 

Ryan Sarni, Esq.
Staff Attorney, MSEC
Ryan earned his law degree from Capital University Law School in Columbus, Ohio. As a labor and employment attorney, Ryan advises and represents over fifty member client companies in all areas of labor and employee relations, including first chair representation at labor negotiations and grievance arbitrations, unemployment hearings, EEOC complaints, Wage and Hour, ADA, FMLA, OSHA, WARN, and NLRB issues. Ryan regularly presents to employers on issues ranging from maintaining positive labor management relations, to employer requirements under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

 

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Your Mindful Year: Engage and Empower Your Employees with Mindfulness!

Summary
You already know your employees? health is one of the most important predictors of your company?s health.

Mindfulness, being aware of your experience in the present moment is integral in any wellness programbecause it changes your brain, perspective, and behavior. Your Mindful Year is an interactive online program that gives you the guidance, structure, and support to live mindfully for an entire year, five minutes at a time. Learn how this simple and accessible program will train your brain to be more focused, clear, and creative, and how it helped 3 diverse organizations decrease their employee stress an average of 30% in 30 days!

 

Diane Sieg RN, CYT, CSP

Diane Sieg RN, CYT, CSP is an emergency room nurse turned professional speaker, author, life coach and yoga teacher. She is the author of Stop Living Life like an Emergency! Rescue Strategies for the Overworked and Overwhelmed, and 30 Days to Grace: The Daily Practice Guide to Achieve Your Ultimate Goals. She has presented to thousands of individuals and organizations across the country and offers a variety of programs to bring mindfulness to organizations in her including keynotes, workshops, and retreats. Diane has attained her Certified Speaking Professional (CSP), a designation held by less than 6% professional speakers in the world.

The Not Me Diabetes Prevention Program: Lessons Learned, Outcomes Experienced and Program Evolution

Summary
United Healthcare implemented the Not Me Diabetes Prevention Program in Colorado in early 2013. This session will provide detailed outcomes for several customers and outline the opportunities to either provide a more successful program or how to build on program success moving forward. In addition, there have been several changes and updates to the Diabetes Prevention Program that will be shared in this session. Finally, we?ll spend time diving into successful marketing and communication tactics and experience the online, virtual program now available. The audience will leave the session understanding how to launch a successful program in their employee populations and build upon the success in subsequent years.

 

Robyn Harmon, MSPH
Health Strategies Consultant, UnitedHealthcare

Robyn Harmon, MSPH, is the Health Strategies Consultant for the Customer Analytics and Solutions Department at UnitedHealthcare. Robyn analyzes and interprets customer utilization and healthcare data to identify potential areas for cost improvements via products, services and clinical programs. She helps customers develop long-term solutions to manage and improve the health of their populations. Robyn has her Masters of Science in Public Health. She has 10 years of experience in public health, health and wellness consulting, and health risk management working with employers, health insurance companies, brokers and at-risk communities. Before joining UnitedHealthcare, Robyn served as a Director of Health Risk Management, Supervisor of a wellness team and was the Health Planner for a local health department.

Tackling Cultural Changes in the Workplace:?How Boulder County is addressing Healthy Eating and Active Living strategies through policy changes, leadership engagement and communications campaigns.

Summary
Boulder County has an award winning, comprehensive wellness program that has shown impactful changes in healthcare costs between wellness program participants and non-participants. The program, managed by Healthbreak, Inc., boasts all the essential elements of a successful program including onsite health screenings, lifestyle management programs, engagement challenges, seminars and workshops and a strong wellness advisory committee.

Over the last eight years, participation in the program has grown from 35% to 66%. The introduction of a health insurance premium reduction for enrollment in the program four years ago resulted in almost a doubling of participation. Then two years ago, participation continued to grow by establishing a health outcomes based strategy that further emphasized the importance of a culture of health.

Though the program is seasoned and impactful, Boulder County recognized the importance and need to address cultural changes in order to elevate the program to the next level and to keep participation and engagement in the program high. Through a partnership between the Wellness program and Boulder County?s internal Public Health department, two important policy strategies were identified for implementation

• Healthy vending
• Healthy meeting policy

 

Boulder County Public Health recognized the need to match up Healthy Eating, Active Living (HEAL) strategies that were being implemented in the communities Boulder County serves, to the strategies being implemented internally through the employee wellness program.

A special committee was formed, and county wide focus groups were conducted. Recommendations were made to improve vending offerings and to institute a policy for serving healthier foods at county sponsored meetings. Other strategies such as promoting activity breaks, walking meetings and decreasing the consumption of sugar sweetened beverages were also determined to be a top priority for Wellness Program cultural activities.

Top leaders were informed of proposed cultural strategies and were asked to support HEAL activities. The Wellness Program is currently implementing policy changes and creating a communications campaign that focuses on a healthy workplace culture. Since beginning efforts to specifically address culture and policy, the program saw a 4% increase in annual enrollment in the program.

 

Emily Cooper

Emily Cooper joined Boulder County in March of 2013 as the Employee Development Coordinator and Co-Wellness Program Manager. ?Prior to that, she spent seven years managing a very busy multi-disciplinary medical clinic in Loveland, CO. ?She has a passion for alternative medicine including acupuncture and chiropractic.? In her wellness role at the county, she is actively involved in engaging employees to participate in open enrollment and challenges throughout the year.? She is committed to fostering of a culture of health, and hopes that it will become second nature like the county?s sustainability initiative. She loves adventure, hiking, walking, biking, Power Barre classes, and camping.

 

Rachel Arndt, AICP, LEED AP
Built Environment and HEAL Coordinator, Boulder County Public Health

Rachel Arndt is the Built Environment and HEAL Coordinator for Boulder County Public Health. Joining the county in 2010, she oversees policy, systems, and built environment changes that seek to increase healthy eating and active living.?During her tenure, Ms. Arndt has worked to integrate health equity and healthy food access into the built environment. In addition to developing municipal code changes that encourage walking and biking and local food production, Ms. Arndt conducted a food access assessment of Boulder County?s food environment, and worked to initiate a double voucher program at the Boulder County Farmers? Markets that provide lower cost fruits and vegetables to residents receiving federal nutrition benefits. She also oversees Boulder County Public Health?s healthy workplace initiatives.

 

Lee Stiffler-Meyer
Healthbreak, Inc.

Lee Stiffler-Meyer is a seasoned health and wellness professional with over 16 years of experience. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Nutrition and a Master’s Degree in Public Health. Lee loves inspiring and empowering people in the workplace to live healthier.

Throughout her career, Lee has led numerous wellness and public health initiatives at the American Cancer Society, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, and Klein Buendel, Inc. As a Senior Account Manager at Healthbreak, Inc., she assists employers with all aspects of their wellness programs.

Lee has had the opportunity to work with a wide variety of populations including adults and children, promoting health and wellness through creative programming, strategic partnerships and creativity. She is passionate about health and believes everyone deserves opportunities to live healthfully. She is a former board member of the Colorado Society for Public Health Education and Slow Food Denver.

Change is Hard: The Promise of Behavioral Economics

Summary
The recent surge of financial incentives being applied to increase participation and engagement in wellness programs has fueled interest in understanding the impact on short and long term change of financial incentives versus intrinsic incentives such as social influences, context of decision making, the framing of decisions, and aversion to loss.?? People often make decisions that are not in their best interest like putting off a doctor visit, skipping medications, or engaging in harmful health behaviors. Traditional economics (with a focus on financial rewards) assumes that people are rational, patient, forward thinking and proficient at decision making. However, we know that people have difficulty making wise choices, especially when faced with decisions that involve uncertainty and tradeoffs between current and future costs and benefits.

Behavioral economics is attracting attention because of its conceptual appeal and the potential to address complex and difficult health decisions. Behavioral economics integrates insights from psychology that acknowledge that people often do not act rationally in an economic sense. It offers a richer set of behavior change tools than have been provided by traditional change theory.

This session will cover three topics including: 1. What is behavioral economics and who contributed to its development?, 2. What does the research to date show about effectiveness of behavioral economics?, and 3. How has a regional wellness provider begun integrating behavioral economics change principles into their messaging and programming.

Key principles of behavioral economics will be discussed including: loss aversion, social influencers, decision making rules of thumb (heuristics), decision fatigue, hyperbolic discounting, the power of present bias, and crowding out (the influence of monetary incentives in reducing the power of intrinsic incentives).?? Influential thought leaders in the field and their unique contributions will be discussed including Dan Ariely, B.J. Fogg, Daniel Kahneman, Amos Tversky, Daniel Pink, Edward Deci, Richard Ryan, Richard Thaler, and Cass Sunstein.

A review of the empirical evidence of the effectiveness of behavioral economics in health care settings will be described. Research supported by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the University of Pennsylvania Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics will be highlighted.

Health Promotion Management, Inc. a regional provider of health promotion services located in Denver will describe an approach they are using to integrate behavioral economics principles into their messaging and programming.

 

John Reidel
President, Riedel and Associates Consultants, Inc.

John is the President of Riedel and Associates Consultants, Inc. (RACI) which provides health and productivity management services to self-insured employers and employer coalitions, health plans, hospitals, disease prevention and disease management providers, and pharmaceutical companies.?? RACI services include market research, survey design and implementation, strategy development, incentives design and deployment, product development and positioning, and evaluation design. John received his MBA from Aurora University (Aurora, IL) and his MPH from the University of Illinois at the Medical Center (Chicago, IL) He holds a Certificate of Applied Management from George Williams College (Downer?s Grove, IL). He lives in the front range mountains of Colorado with his wife Mary and his dog Huck, a Hurricane Katrina survivor.

 

Lisa Bailey
President, Health Promotion Management, Inc.

Lisa Bailey is the CEO, President and owner of Health Promotion Management. HPMI is an employee engagement company and is a well-respected source for results-oriented health management programs that produce results. Over the last 30 years, their clients have seen increased engagement levels among employees, positive wellness attitudes and behaviors and have also realized significant hard-dollar savings ? in the areas of health care costs, absenteeism and workers? comp.

Lisa has been involved with state-wide efforts to promote healthy workplaces in Colorado for the past 20+ years. That work resulted in the development of this annual conference, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment?s toolkit for Colorado worksites and she provided state-wide training for employers. She is also a contributor to ACSM?s Worksite Health Promotion Manual.

Colorado’s Healthiest Places to Work: Taking a Look at Businesses who are Succeeding at Targeting Whole Health for their Employees

HealthLinks

Summary
Health Links Colorado is a non-profit initiative to help businesses across the state adopt effective organizational strategies for health and safety. Health Links certifies businesses through an evidence-based assessment tool that measures organizational factors. To date, Health Links has certified 78 Colorado organizations in 11 counties. This session will expand on what we?ve learned from the Healthy Business Certification Assessment and from advising businesses in the field. During advising sessions we train and educate businesses on how to create and implement a program for sustainable employee health and safety strategies and policies. By presenting industry and regionally specific case-studies and data, we will identify what businesses are doing across the state to address the whole health of their employees. Data collected helps address the question What Really Works in Worksite Wellness? Results indicate that employers in Colorado are adopting and implementing programs that are focused on nutrition (74%), physical activity (72%) and stress management (50%). 19% of certified businesses are coordinating wellness with safety programs and 48% are assessing employees’ needs annually. After the session, participants will gain an understanding of the best-practices for addressing employee health and safety at the workplace, learn how businesses are overcoming barriers to addressing employee whole health, and learn how to work with local community health and wellness coalition groups to create a program that fits their unique needs.

 

Michelle Haan, MPH, received her Masters of Public Health Degree from the Colorado School of Public Health with a focus on Community and Behavioral Health. As the Program Manager for Health Links^TM, Michelle works with local business communities in Colorado to help them adopt and implement evidence-based worksite wellness programs that improve the health, safety and productivity of their employees, families and community.. The passion and enthusiasm she gets to see in the employees that she meets is what keeps the program running each day. As part of her management role, Michelle helped to develop and launch the Health Links^TM Advising Program that trains community and business members to conduct one-on-one advising sessions for creating sustainable worksite wellness programs in small businesses. Michelle loves finding new ways to help small business bring wellness to work.

Co-Presenter: Liliana Tenney, Co-Founder/Director Health Links Colorado

Lili Tenney is the Deputy Director at the Center for Worker Health and Environment and an instructor at the Colorado School of Public Health. Lili is the Co-Founder and Director of Health Links, an initiative to promote Total Worker Health in small businesses by providing them expert advising, certification, and connection to local health, safety and wellness services. She conducts research on workplace health and safety programs and the impact of these programs on personal health outcomes, workplace culture, and business performance.

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Helping Colorado Citizens Drive, Deliver, and Buy Value in Health Care using APCD data

Summary
The Colorado All Payer Claims Database (APCD) is the state’s most comprehensive source of health claims data from across Medicaid, Medicare, Medicare Advantage and the largest 20 commercial payers in the state. The data in the APCD is used to unlock information and insights that guide how health care gets delivered, used and paid for in the state of Colorado. Statewide cost and utilization data has been available publicly since November 2012, and in July 2014 consumer-focused price and quality information were published on the public website, www.comedprice.org, for the first time. The website shows median prices insurance companies and patients combined actually pay for specific services at named facilities; a cost calculator to help patients estimate their own potential out-of-pocket share; and includes information on the quality of the services and facilities depicted. Plans are in place to add additional facility types and services over the next year to expand search options for consumers.

Custom datasets and reports from the APCD are also available to inform projects intending to advance health, improve care and lower costs in Colorado. Employers can use the data in a variety of innovative ways including to inform effective benefit design, to incentivize employees to seek care from high value providers, and evaluate alternative payment models that promote high quality, low cost services.

 

Tracey D. Campbell
Director, CO All Payer Claims Database
Center for Improving Value in Healthcare (CIVHC)

Ms. Campbell is a seasoned health care executive with over 25 years of health care IT experience. She has held positions at McKesson, Inteck, HealthTrio, and most recently with Numera, a telehealth care management solutions company. Her experience includes working with consumers, payers, providers, hospital systems and other health related businesses. In her role as APCD Director, Tracey is responsible for all aspects of the strategy, implementation, operation and sustainability of Colorado’s APCD. She plays a key role in working with CIVHC’s stakeholders including consumers, payers, businesses, providers and policy makers who together will help move Colorado to better health, better care and lower costs by using this unique Colorado resource. Tracey holds a Bachelor of Science in Journalism from the University of Kansas.

Powerful Impact: Managers Impact on Employees Health and Well-Being

Summary
This interactive session examines the specific managerial behaviors and leadership styles that impact employees health on a physiological and emotional level. Managers and supervisory behavior has been shown to effect employees weight, blood pressure, BMI, overall cardiovascular health and diagnoses of depression and anxiety which often constitute the same lifestyle health problems most wellness programs are designed to address. As wellness programs become more sophisticated and ask for more accountability on the part of employees, the role of managerial behavior, leadership practices and overall organizational culture must be accounted for as a driver of healthy employees and workplaces. Participants will have the opportunity to explore their own managerial and leadership behavior as part of this discussion. Managerial behavior does have a distinct role in building and reinforcing a resilient, healthy workforce and workplace and leadership development programs should become an integral component of effective workplace well-being programs.

 

Ken Pinnock MS, SPHR, GPHR
Associate Director Human Resources, University of Denver

Ken is the Associate Director of Human Resources and oversees Talent Management programs and initiatives and Employee Relations for the University of Denver, in Denver Colorado. Prior to joining the University he was the Director of Human Resource Services, then Director of Mountain States Employers Council’s Regional Office in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Ken’s previous work has included consulting and working with a variety of organizations in the private and public sector on many facets of HR including strategy, employee relations, compensation and benefits, staffing and measurement. He has been a frequent presenter and facilitator with organizations in the United States, Canada and Europe, as well as local, regional and national conferences. Ken is a faculty member for the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) and an Adjunct Faculty member in the Strategic Human Resource Management graduate program at the University of Denver.

Ken holds a Masters Degree in Management from Regis University in Denver and is a graduate of the University of Denver?s business school with a degree in Business Management. He has also earned the (SPHR) and (GPHR) designation through the HR Certification Institute in Alexandria, Virginia.

Seasoning the Seasoned Program: How the City of Littleton Drives Health Outcomes and Cost Containment?????

Summary
The City of Littleton has had an employee wellness program in place for nearly two decades. In the fall of 2009 they put the wheels in motion to methodically transition from a participatory program to a health-contingent, outcomes-based program with one key focus…to help City employees reach their highest wellness potential. This five year outcomes-based strategy has been a collaborative effort between the City and its wellness program and onsite health clinic providers. The City introduced a health plan with no deductibles for employees that enrolled in the wellness program and were willing to take action on their health status. Biometric values and tobacco status were leveraged to benchmark health improvement and incentive criteria.

This session will be presented by the City of Littleton?s Acting Human Resources Business Partner and the President of their wellness program provider, Healthbreak. Together, they will provide the organizational background, outcome-based strategy components, communication campaign, environmental improvements and overall program impact. Program impact data will be shared that demonstrates improvements in participant risk data as well as the cost containment experienced by the City.

 

Kathy Knudsen, MA
Founder & President
Healthbreak, Inc

Kathy has been a recognized leader in the worksite wellness industry for more nearly three decades.? An outstanding athlete and three-time Hall of Fame inductee, Kathy infuses her company and her daily life with her passion for wellness and energized living. Her professional accomplishments are reflected through the numerous wellness awards that have been earned by the employers that Healthbreak serves. Kathy is a dedicated and dynamic speaker on a wide range of health and fitness topics. She was instrumental in moving worksite wellness efforts forward in Colorado by serving on numerous committees and delivering wellness trainings for employers across the state. Kathy earned a Bachelor of Science in Exercise Science and a Master of Arts in Corporate Fitness Management from the University of Nebraska at Omaha.

 

Julie Lanier, PHR
Human Resources, City of Littleton

Julie received her B.A. in Communication from University of Colorado, Boulder in 2003 and has been in the Human Resources field for the past nine years, both in the private and public sector. As a mother of two young children Julie, understands the importance of workplace wellness and the benefits it carries both in and outside of the workplace. Currently serving as the Acting Human Resources Business Partner for the City of Littleton, she joined the Human Resources team in June of 2013 and has been involved in leading employee wellness activities — focusing on walking and cycling. Julie believes in removing barriers, meeting employees where they are in regards to wellness and making wellness fun as a means of increasing employee participation. Between partnering with wellness activities, already in place, and leading new initiatives Julie shows employees that walking and cycling are easy to incorporate into everyday life.

You can lead a horse to water…7 reasons employees aren’t participating

Summary
This presentation will focus on the main complaints people have that stop them participating. We will cover the special needs of:

• The overweight population
• The suit-wearing-don’t-get-me-sweaty population
• The ambivalent population
• The career-focused population

 

The presentation will address each of the above as a different group that requires special and personalized attention and action in order to get full participation. There will also be a focus on synergy, having certain members of staff participating (and promoting their participation) in order to get people to step up and pay attention to the program and the good it can do.

Lastly, there will be a presentation on how to create a program that can suit all of the above populations and how to make that work across different sizes of corporations. A major problem is that populations have large home offices and small remote office locations with significantly less resources. How to measure and create according to the lowest common denominator and ways to incentivize and promote participation will also be explained.

 

Jamie Atlas
Owner, Bonza Bodies Fitness

Jamie Atlas, owner of local award winning fitness studio Bonza Bodies Fitness has studied both neuroscience and sports science. His passion for helping others is seen in his work for local non-profit Livewell Colorado as the Livewell RallyMan, speaking to communities and corporations about realistic, applicable changes that can be implemented with minimal effort to create maximal change. A regular contributor to local news and television stations, his passion for creating change and changing the way we think about change is contagious and entertaining.

Is the Health Risk Assessment (HRA) Obsolete?

Summary
If you have attended any of the top wellness conferences last year, you may think the Health Risk Assessment is obsolete. With many programs under attack for not showing a stellar ROI, the Health Risk Assessment has been blamed for the wellness program?s shortcomings. However, before we ?throw the baby out with the bath water?, let?s understand the value and the challenges with the traditional health risk assessment.

Recent surveys suggest that 50% of employers are increasingly skeptical about health risk assessments (HRAs).?? Although we would like to think that wellness programs have evolved quite a bit over the years, many industry experts who have been in the field for a long time (30+ years) state that they largely remain the same. Generally, an organization starts with all its employees (let?s say 1000). They assess those employees in some manner.?? Maybe half of them complete the health risk assessment so we are down to 500 now. Then we target the highest risk employees with interventions thinking that they are driving the cost (maybe 20% of the 500, or 100 employees). Of those 100 employees maybe half of them will take part in the interventions we are offering and before we know it we have engaged 50 employees out of 1000. Sure the assessments and interventions have changed over time, but this model really has not. And it?s about time it does.

Join us for a stimulating discussion about this topic to help you make an informed decision on whether your organization needs to keep an HRA as an integral part of your wellness program and what are key must have strategies that can be leveraged to engage employees in making healthier choices that are sustainable.

 

Colleen Reilly, MBA, MSM
Founder, Total Well-Being

Colleen M. Reilly, MBA, MSM is the president and founder of Total Well-Being, the nation?s leading provider of Performance-based Corporate Wellness. She was the former Director of Wellness & Benefits at Nelnet, where she was responsible for increasing employee engagement and managing healthcare costs. Before Nelnet, Ms. Reilly worked for the Mayo Clinic as a strategic health management consultant helping their Fortune 500 clients design and formulate effective integration, incentive and promotion strategies. Prior Mayo Clinic, she spent over 7 years with Coors Brewing Company running their Health & Productivity department. She has a double Masters in Business Administration and Sports and Wellness Management from the University of Denver.

 

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