The Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004 required school districts to establish a local school wellness policy by the first day of the 2006-2007 school year. To provide a baseline measure of the extent to which wellness-related policies were implemented in school districts nationwide in 2006, this study analyzed data from the 2006 School Health Policies and Programs Study (SHPPS)...

PURPOSE To develop a theory-based questionnaire to assess readiness for change in small workplaces adopting wellness programs. DESIGN In developing our scale, we first tested items via "think-aloud" interviews. We tested the revised items in a cross-sectional quantitative telephone survey. SETTING The study setting comprised small workplaces (20-250 employees) in low-wage industries. SUBJ...

Community-based wellness and prevention programs have long served to address the needs of an aging population with multiple chronic diseases. Title IIID of the Older Americans Act, passed in 1987, called for the Administration on Aging (AoA) to fund “education and implementation activities that support healthy lifestyles and promote healthy behaviors (1).” AoA, now a part of the Administration ...

OBJECTIVE To identify and compare awareness of intellectual wellness in male and female medical students of Karachi. METHODS The cross-sectional questionnaire-based survey comprised randomly selected 800 medical students of both gender. It was conducted from January to December 2010 in 8 medical colleges of Karachi. Responses--never, sometimes, mostly and always (numbered 0-4)--were analysed ...

OBJECTIVES Using a large natural experiment among 39 employers, we examined the effect of adding financial incentives to workplace wellness programs. STUDY DESIGN The 39 study employers used the same national insurer to administer their wellness programs, allowing us to observe preventive and health-promoting behaviors before and after financial incentives were implemented. Fifteen treatment ...

This article describes the current state of workplace wellness programs in the United States, including typical program components; assesses current uptake among U.S. employers; reviews the evidence for program impact; and evaluates the current use and the impact of incentives to promote employee engagement. Wellness programs have become very common, as 92 percent of employers with 200 or more ...

Social media platforms have become the most popular means for users to share what is happening around them. The abundance and growing usage of social media has resulted in a large repository of users’ social posts, which provides a stethoscope for inferring individuals’ lifestyle and wellness. As users’ social accounts implicitly reflect their habits, preferences, and feelings, it is feasible f...

Employers are increasingly interested in improving employee health, with the goals of reducing health care costs and increasing productivity. As of 2010, 74% of employers who offered health insurance also offered a wellness program, and the prevalence is increasing. However, there is vigorous debate about whether employee wellness programs actually work to improve health. Although proponents as...