One of the most valuable benefits an employer can provide an employee is guidance through the complex health care and workers compensation systems. Coordinating the relationships with providers, insurance carriers, and the employer can be frustrating for the employees. A novel and effective solution is the Health and Wellness Room, which:
- Makes the treatment regimen more effective, by supporting the psychosocial as well as the physical needs
- Hastens return-to-work by supporting treatment adherence and increasing employee motivation
- Restores employee autonomy and avoid learned disability behaviors
Professionally-managed Health and Wellness Rooms provide a safe environment in which an injured employee can begin returning to full activity. Meaningful activities, augmented with education about safe work practices, reverses the trends toward “learned” disability common in the workers’ compensation system. Instructions for coping with their injury during the healing process creates the mindset of ‘managing one’s own condition’ and helps restore autonomy, even the invincibility an individual feels when they are well.
The multidimensional approach provided in the Health and Wellness Room model has been recommended by physicians at Harvard Medical School as a superior response to work-related injuries. It has also been ruled as a “non-punitive assignment” by the WCAB (Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board), supported by dozens of medical providers, CEO’s and CFO’s, and even “agreed to” by several Union Organizations as a necessary program to help companies keep their doors open.
Beyond the benefits provided to the employee, substantial value accrues to the employer. By restoring function, motivation and autonomy to the employee, the Health and Wellness Room model tends to “cut the tail off” of workers’ compensation claims. Without such proactive intervention, many injured employees experience longer treatment regimens and time away from work, thus driving employer costs up.
