John Hickman presented "Leveraging Financial Incentive Programs to Promote Healthy Behavior, Contain Health Care Costs and Increase Employee Productivity: Overcoming Legal Compliance Hurdles" during this teleseminar sponsored by the Centers for Competitive Management. It is well documented that for most employers and health plans, the bulk of health care costs are incurred by a very small percentage of their respective populations – high-risk employees. In fact, researchers have found that over that past 15 years, preventable illnesses are responsible for over 70 percent of health care costs. John's discussion included the following topics so that participants would learn how to:
- Effectively communicate compliant program design and eliminate legal liability
- Involve senior management in promoting health and productivity
- Tie company goals to employee health to engage the entire community
- Promote behavior change throughout the organization
- Engage participants by offering them control over the design, interventions and the rewards
- Establish appropriate baselines and evaluate the effectiveness of company incentive programs
- Ensure compliance with the new Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA), DOL regulations, and HIPAA non-discrimination rules
- Understand the tax implications of financial incentives
February 2, 2009