Guidance on Outcomes-Based Wellness

More employers are offering health incentives for achievement and not solely participation. In Aon Hewitt's 2012 Health Care Survey, for example, 58% of companies say they offer such outcomes-based incentives for completing a tobacco cessation program, losing weight or lowering cholesterol.

With PPACA’s allowance for larger incentives, the use of outcomes-based incentives is expected to increase, despite our not having a large body of research proving their effectiveness. In response, six health organizations offer their guidance in the July 2012 issue of JOEM. Their joint consensus statement, Guidance for a Reasonably Designed, Employer-Sponsored Wellness Program Using Outcomes-Based Incentives, forms the basis for our September show. 

Join us on CoHealth Checkup as representatives from four of the six organizations discuss why they felt it critical to offer guidance, and what their guidance covers.

Guests:

• Lauren Whitsel, Ph.D.
  Director of Policy Research, American Heart Association
• Jerry Noyce, President & CEO, HERO
• Ron Loepke, MD, MPH, FACOEM, FACPM
  Vice Chairman, U.S. Preventive Medicine, Inc.
• Alan Balch, Ph.D.
  Vice President, Preventive Health Partnership, American Cancer Society