The Association Between Incentive Designs and Health Assessment or Biometric Screening Completion.

Objectives: To identify statistically significant predictors for completing a Personal Health Assessment (PHA) or biometric screening from attributes of incentive designs.

Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted that included 426,694 members from 56 employer groups who required a PHA or screening as part of their incentive during 2016.

Results: Incentive designs that combine high-value with immediate disbursement can relatively increase employee PHA participation by as much as 66% over plans with low-value and delayed disbursement (56.

Evidence-Based Nonpharmacologic Strategies for Comprehensive Pain Care: The Consortium Pain Task Force White Paper.

Medical pain management is in crisis; from the pervasiveness of pain to inadequate pain treatment, from the escalation of prescription opioids to an epidemic in addiction, diversion and overdose deaths. The rising costs of pain care and managing adverse effects of that care have prompted action from state and federal agencies including the DOD, VHA, NIH, FDA and CDC. There is pressure for pain medicine to shift away from reliance on opioids, ineffective procedures and surgeries toward comprehensive pain management that includes evidence-based nonpharmacologic options.

The Stock Performance of C. Everett Koop Award Winners Compared With the Standard & Poor's 500 Index.

Objective: To explore the link between companies investing in the health and well-being programs of their employees and stock market performance.

Methods: Stock performance of C. Everett Koop National Health Award winners (n = 26) was measured over time and compared with the average performance of companies comprising the Standard and Poor's (S&P) 500 Index.

Do workplace health promotion (wellness) programs work?

Objective: To respond to the question, "Do workplace health promotion programs work?"

Methods: A compilation of the evidence on workplace programs' effectiveness coupled with recommendations for critical review of outcome studies. Also, reviewed are recent studies questioning the value of workplace programs.

Results: Evidence accumulated over the past three decades shows that well-designed and well-executed programs that are founded on evidence-based principles can achieve positive health and financial outcomes.

Mindfulness goes to work: impact of an online workplace intervention.

Objective: The objective of this study was to determine whether a mindfulness program, created for the workplace, was both practical and efficacious in decreasing employee stress while enhancing resiliency and well-being.

Methods: Participants (89) recruited from The Dow Chemical Company were selected and randomly assigned to an online mindfulness intervention (n = 44) or wait-list control (n = 45). Participants completed the Perceived Stress Scale, the Five Facets of Mindfulness Questionnaire, the Connor-Davidson Resiliency Scale, and the Shirom Vigor Scale at pre- and postintervention and 6-month follow-up.

Description of a clinical stream of back-pain patients based on electronic medical records.

Back pain consists of a spectrum of conditions, with no common etiology and therefore no dominant method of treatment. The purpose of this study is to describe the complexity of a collection of 8000 back pain patients who appeared in an integrative medicine clinic, as a prelude to conducing comparative effectiveness research on CAM alternatives to conventional therapy. Approximately 23% of all clinic patients were diagnosed at some time with back pain.

A review and analysis of the clinical and cost-effectiveness studies of comprehensive health promotion and disease management programs at the worksite: update VIII 2008 to 2010.

Objective: This critical review focuses on the 27 new studies focused on the clinical and cost outcomes research focused on worksites and published between 2008 to 2010.

Methods: A comprehensive search was conducted using a multi-stage process that included a MEDLINE, ERIC, ADI, EDGAR, CARL, Inform, Lexis-Nexis databases, and direct inquires to worksite researchers and corporate medical directors.

Results: Clearly, these new studies indicate further evidence of positive outcomes since, the quantity and quality of such research continues to improve.

Development and testing of the Workplace Stressors Assessment Questionnaire.

Objective: This research was aimed at developing a self-completed questionnaire for use in the assessment of stress-related factors at a US government high-tech worksite.

Methods: A literature review was performed to identify existing scales of workplace stress and strain. An initial pool of potential items was developed and assessed for content validity by using focus groups.

Health and medical economics applied to integrative medicine.

Cost-benefit analyses (CBA) of every aspect of health and medical care are a necessity to address both the clinical effectiveness and cost effectiveness of health and medical care for the purpose of allocating limited practitioner, organizational, governmental, and monetary resources while maintaining the highest quality outcomes. In response, there are an array of approaches that emphasize the full continuum of prevention, restructuring primary care, involvement of the workplace and communities, and adoption of innovative strategies and interventions ranging from genomic assessments to complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). Among these approaches is an integrative medicine (IM) model that is consistent with these national objectives and that uniquely and explicitly includes "evidence-based global medical strategies" in its definition.

A review and analysis of the clinical and cost-effectiveness studies of comprehensive health promotion and disease management programs at the worksite: update VII 2004-2008.

Objective: To conduct the seventh periodic review and analysis of the clinical and cost-effectiveness research conducted in worksite/corporate environments between 2004 and 2008.

Methods: A literature search of US-based research was conducted using a multistage process including MEDLINE, ADI, EDGAR, CARL, Inform, Lexis-Nexis, as well as direct inquiries to key researchers in this area of expertise.

Results: From 2004 to 2008, there were 16 new studies that met the Inclusion/Exclusion criteria.

Using a return-on-investment estimation model to evaluate outcomes from an obesity management worksite health promotion program.

Objective: Certain modifiable risk factors lead to higher health care costs and reduced worker productivity. A predictive return-on-investment (ROI) model was applied to an obesity management intervention to demonstrate the use of econometric modeling in establishing financial justification for worksite health promotion.

Methods: Self-reported risk factors (n = 890) were analyzed using chi2 and t test methods.

Emerging trends in health and productivity management.

Many large U.S. employers have generally embraced a Health and Productivity Management (HPM) perspective to guide their multiple employee health management efforts.

Developing a self-report outcome measure for complementary and alternative medicine.

Objective: Our objective was to develop a pilot measure of subjective outcomes of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM). Current options for assessing subjective outcomes in CAM are either too burdensome or fail to represent diverse outcomes. A single measure specifying common, patient-reported outcomes of CAM would be of value.

Care management program evaluation: constituents, conflicts, and moves toward standardization.

Care management program evaluations bring together constituents from finance, medicine, and social sciences. The differing assumptions and scientific philosophies that these constituents bring to the task often lead to frustrations and even contentions. Given the forms and variations of care management programs, the difficulty associated with program outcomes measurement should not be surprising.

A review and analysis of the clinical and cost-effectiveness studies of comprehensive health promotion and disease management programs at the worksite: update VI 2000-2004.

This critical review focuses on the 12 new studies focused on the clinical and cost outcomes research focused on worksites and published between 2000 and 2004. Although these new studies indicate further evidence of positive clinical and cost outcomes, the quantity and quality of such research continue to decline. When corporations and health plans are demanding more evidence-based outcomes, this decline in rigorous research marks a serious challenge to the field of health promotion and disease management.

The selection effects of the inclusion of a chiropractic benefit on the patient population of a managed health care organization.

Objective: The aim of this study is to measure the selection effects of the inclusion of a chiropractic benefit on a managed care health plan.

Design: An analysis of enrollment data from a managed care health plan over a 4-year period was conducted. Employers could select the managed care plan with or without a chiropractic care benefit.

International collaboration in health promotion and disease management: implications of U.S. health promotion efforts on Japan's health care system.

For more than 25 years, health promotion and disease management interventions have been conducted by large employers in the United States. Today there are more than 100 studies of such multifactorial, comprehensive interventions that all demonstrate positive clinical outcomes. For those interventions that have also been evaluated for return on investment, all but one have demonstrated cost-effectiveness.

Population health management as a strategy for creation of optimal healing environments in worksite and corporate settings.

This paper provides an (OHE) overview of a population health management (PHM) approach to the creation of optimal healing environments (OHEs) in worksite and corporate settings. It presents a framework for consideration as the context for potential research projects to examine the health, well-being, and economic effects of a set of newer "virtual" prevention interventions operating in an integrated manner in worksite settings. The main topics discussed are the fundamentals of PHM with basic terminology and core principles, a description of PHM core technology and implications of a PHM approach to creating OHEs.

Chiropractic care: is it substitution care or add-on care in corporate medical plans?

An analysis of claims data from a managed care health plan was performed to evaluate whether patients use chiropractic care as a substitution for medical care or in addition to medical care. Rates of neuromusculoskeletal complaints in 9e diagnostic categories were compared between groups with and without chiropractic coverage. For the 4-year study period, there were 3,129,752 insured member years in the groups with chiropractic coverage and 5,197,686 insured member years in the groups without chiropractic coverage.

Mind-body medicine in ambulatory care: an evidence-based assessment.

Ambulatory medicine is a frequent clinical setting where practitioners can effectively apply Mind-body interventions ranging from basic stress management therapies to the sophisticated biomedical instrumentation of clinical biofeedback. Given the rather extensive and growing body of clinical research in this area, the intent of this article is to provide an evidence-based assessment of the evidence underlying the clinical efficiency of such interventions. Such an evidence-based approach can help ambulatory care providers to identify those Mind-body interventions with specific clinical indication so that they can be utilized both safely and effectively in ambulatory medicine.