alecnewmane: Health Care Reform: Who's responsible?

I just got back from the Business Review Power Breakfast at Glen Sanders Mansion. Today?s topic of discussion was Health Care at the Crossroads: The Drive Toward Reform.

I left feeling optimistic yet overlooked. Seriously. So much talk about numbers, expensive hospital additions, billion dollar?electronic health records, reimbursement models, and ER measurement?utilization, to name a few topics of discussion.?I?m sure if you were a large companies CEO in attendance you may have been impressed, but I wasn?t. Not entirely.

So why did I feel optimistic? A large part of New York State Commissioner of Health, Dr Nirav R. Shah?s message was appealing. I would like to have heard him speak more. I found it most interesting when he spoke of the necessary paradigm shift in ownership of health care and the necessity for businesses to start asking their providers ? what services will you provide to my employees to help keep them healthy?? This is refreshing since our culture has been ingrained to look at health insurance as something we mostly use when we get sick.

Preventative care. It?s the big buzz word as of late. As a fitness and wellness professional I am all on board.

But might I take that a step further and ask what the employers are doing to help keep their employees healthy?

Would that be too bold an assumption? I don?t think so.

Some companies are starting to take a deeper interest in their employees health because it affects their bottom line. The healthier your employees, the lower your insurance costs. Win win.

So companies are starting to look around and ask questions. What can I do to help my employees get healthier? Offer fitness classes? Offer monetary incentives like a deductible that can be put towards a gym membership or a deduction on their health insurance cost?

And furthermore, how do you measure that? How is one able to show that employees are actually getting healthier and that these programs are truly effective?

These are all great questions and I am glad they are finally being asked but can I also point out the irony?

The reason so many people are unhealthy in the first place is because of our work culture. The do more, do better, and do it faster mentality that every worker faces day to day.

CEO and President of St Peter?s Health Partners, James K. Reed, spoke on?today?s?panel as well. He did speak about doing more with less but he was referring to less medical procedures, like?unnecessary?MRI?s. He wasn?t referring to people. ?He also spoke of the need for better communication in the medical field on all levels. But I couldn?t help but feel that even that message did not include every day people like you and I.

And that is the problem. How do you get a whole community of people to care about being healthier if most of what you do is talk over their heads and about them merely as numbers? As dollars?

You don?t.

I see clients daily who are over worked, over stressed, under nourished, sleep deprived, extremely deconditioned, and over prescribed. These are well educated people with good paying jobs. They are doing it all and paying the price because it is what our culture expects.

Studies have shown that simply getting a good nights sleep on a regular basis can have worlds of impact on ones health in a positive way. That?s right. Sleep. But who?s got time for that, right? Seriously. I can imagine most of you laughing as you read this. Yet it is such a simple, free fix.

In addition, many people who are overweight are not eating enough calories or the right kind of calories for most of the day, and when they do eat, the choices are usually something quick and nutrient void. Why? It isn?t because they cannot afford healthy food. It?s because they are too busy.

I have clients who don?t even keep up with the renewal of their necessary medical prescriptions because, you guessed it, they are too busy.

So when I sit at a discussion such as the one I attended today, I think a large part of the puzzle is being overlooked. Businesses are now worrying as the health care system is changing. ?They suddenly can?t afford to have unhealthy employees. That?s great but you can?t just care about your bottom line. You have to truly care about your?people.

James Reed spoke of the greater need for compassion and connection from our doctors and nurses, for more effective communication. He also spoke of the desire for large companies to go to him directly to open up the discussion regarding medical care for their employees.

My question is: Who is talking to the employees? Who is showing them compassion? Who is truly investing in and opening up the discussion to them?

And this does not take the ownership away form the individual either. We are all in this together. And I think the Commissioner,Dr. Shah, did a fairly good job of trying to point that out.

But let?s face it. People spend most waking hours of their week at work. That is where a large part of their lives are spent. If employers can get their employees to make healthier choices in the work place, those benefits will carry over.

Offer on site fitness programming, health screenings, health education, and any other services that will help to make the lives of your employees less stressful and more productive. And offer incentives for participation. Get creative and also make it fun.

Human nature and resistance to change really were at the core of much of what was spoken about today. It?s normal. No one likes change. But people are much more likely to make that step towards it when you show a true investment in them rather than treating them solely as an investment.