KP gets the gold for employee wellness

Best Employer for Healthy Lifestyles award honors KP programs

TUESDAY, JUNE 7, 2011

Rancho Cordova Internal Service Claims team members exercise together

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The following video and story are examples of how the Healthy Workforce initiatives are helping KP workers to be their best.

• Healthy living, healthy working [Video]
• Being a loser helps KP employees thrive [Story]

At the Harbor MacArthur Medical Office Building in Santa Ana (Southern California), more than 100 Kaiser Permanente employees and physicians have participated in a Biggest Loser contest—collectively dropping nearly 700 pounds in the first five months of 2011.

At Pleasanton Medical Offices in Northern California, a group of former couch potatoes meets three times a week for a lunchtime run.

In Colorado, a KP nurse quit smoking and lost 90 pounds after taking KP’s total health assessment—and gave her family and herself a happier life.

These workers and thousands of others across KP helped Kaiser Permanente and Kaiser Permanente Northern California each to win a “Best Employers for Healthy Lifestyles” gold award from the National Business Group on Health (NGBH).

The award recognizes organizations that have found creative solutions to advancing the wellbeing of employees. One went to KP for its Healthy Workforce initiative, which was launched across the program in 2010 in partnership with the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions; the other went for the Northern California Region’s Live Well Be Well wellness program.

Both programs offer confidential health assessments, personal health coaching and other services.

NBGH, an influential nonprofit representing large employers' perspective on national health policy, recognized 24 employers across the country with its gold award. (Another 24 companies, with more established wellness programs, qualified for a platinum award.)

“It’s a great honor, but we know that it’s just the beginning,” said a joint statement from John August, executive director of the Coalition of Kaiser Permanente Unions; Chuck Columbus, senior vice president and chief human resources officer; and Arthur M. Southam, MD, executive vice president, health plan operations. The message, which went out to all KP employees, continued: “The program is only as successful as it is helpful to our workforce. We encourage you to take advantage of all the programs that Healthy Workforce offers.”

• For more information about Healthy Workforce and its programs, services, and tools it offers, go to kp.org/healthyworkforce.
• To sign up for KP Walk!, a program to help you walk for fun and better health, go to www.kpwalk.com.
• Complete the total health assessment (THA) for 2011. Kaiser Permanente will donate $50 for every THA completed by an eligible employee, dentist and physician in 2011. Donations support Wholesome Wave and the National Assembly on School-Based Health Care activities within our regions.