Workplace health promotion is the combined efforts of employers, employees, and society to improve the mental and physical health and well-being of people at work. The term workplace health promotion denotes a comprehensive analysis and design of human and organizational work levels with the strategic aim of developing and improving health resources in an enterprise. The World Health Organization has prioritized the workplace as a setting for health promotion because of the large potential audience and influence on all spheres of a person's life. The Luxembourg Declaration provides that health and well-being of employees at work can be achieved through a combination of:
Improving the organization and the working environment Promoting active participation Encouraging personal development. Workplace health promotion combines alleviation of health risk factors with enhancement of health strengthening factors and seeks to further develop protection factors and health potentials. Workplace health promotion is complementary to the discipline of occupational safety and health, which consists of protecting workers from hazards. Successful workplace health promotion strategies include the principles of participation, project management, integration, and comprehensiveness:
Participation: all staff must be included in all program stages Project management: programs must be oriented toward the problem-solving cycle Integration: programs must be incorporated into company management practices and workplace health-promotion strategies should influence corporate planning Comprehensiveness: programs must incorporate interdisciplinary individual-directed and environment-directed health strategies. A report by the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work notes growing evidence that significant cost savings can be made by implementing workplace health promotion strategies, and over 90% of United States workplaces with greater than 50 employees have health promotion programs in place.
Strategies to promote health in the workplace
Strategies for workplace health promotion need to be inclusive to account for diversity in the workforce, and behavioral economics is a key tool for implementing workplace health programs. The United States Department of Health and Human Services includes five strategic guidelines for workplace health promotion in its Healthy People 2010 initiative. These include:
Health education, focused on skill development and lifestyle behavior change along with information dissemination and awareness building. Supportive social and physical environments, reflecting the organization's expectations regarding health behaviors and implementing policies promoting healthy behaviors. Integration of the worksite program into the organization's benefits, human resources infrastructure, and environmental health and safety initiatives. Links between health promotion and related programs like employee assistance. Screenings followed by counseling and education on how to best use medical services for necessary follow-up. More generally, workplace health promotion efforts are implemented at three functional levels, including:
Level I: awareness programs such as newsletters, health fairs, and educational classes that may or may not directly improve individual health or influence behavioral change. Level II: lifestyle modification programs of 8 to 12 weeks duration that are available to employees on an ongoing basis and directly influence health outcomes. Level III: the creation of a work environment that assists employees in sustaining healthy lifestyles and behaviors, such as workplace cafeterias offering healthy food choices or the provision of workplace exercise facilities. In most instances physical activity interventions conform to Level II of this framework and may also include elements from Level III. Incentive-based Fitness Rewards Programs (FRPs) aim to influence employee behaviors and thereby conform to Level I.
Physical activity interventions Approximately half of all current workplace health promotion programs are based on physical activity interventions given the relative ease by which employers can advocate such efforts to employees. Employer-sponsored activity interventions in the form of team sports originated as early as the 17th century in the United Kingdom, however, most 21st century interventions rely on employer sponsorship of employee access to health and fitness facilities. Employee convenience to sponsored fitness facilities strongly influences program participation, and facilities located near employee locations of residence hold lower time costs, receive increased use, and yield better program and health outcomes. Women frequently demonstrate lower participation in workplace exercise programs than men, and young, single individuals are often more predisposed to pursue employer-sponsored physical activity initiatives. In many cases, exercise-based workplace health promotion programs struggle to attract those who would benefit the most from such fitness efforts, including aging, sedentary, blue-collar, female, or less-educated employees. The sedentary nature of many modern workplaces increases negative metabolic risk factors such as high body mass index (BMI), waist circumference, and blood pressure and elevated fasting glucose and triglyceride levels. Breaking up long periods of sedentary time is shown to improve these risks. Specifically, utilization of portable pedal exercise machines in office environments has been shown to improve employee health, and use was demonstrated feasible during working hours. Interventions using pedometers to influence employee behavior, decrease the duration of sedentary periods, and increase total movement during the work day have also proven successful. Smartphone applications and workplace signs promoting stair use are known to improve employee health, and many employers are now investing in wearable technologies to encourage employees to monitor physical activity. Workplace Tai Chi programs have also proven effective as a health intervention and means of reducing absenteeism, particularly in older workers. Despite these efforts, many health promotion programs struggle with poor participation, and the introduction of incentives is shown to improve employee involvement.
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