From the Editor
Editor's Notes May/June 2013
Michael P. O'Donnell, PhD, MBA, MPH
Will Classic Workplace Health Promotion Strategies Work for Medicare?
In 2009, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) launched a 3-year experiment titled the Senior Risk Reduction Demonstration (SRRD) to determine if classic workplace health promotion strategies consisting of a health risk assessment (HRA), feedback, and skill building would improve the health of Medicare beneficiaries and also reduce Medicare costs. (1) (In the interest of full disclosure, I was one of a large team of advisors who helped design the study. I had no role in any other aspect of the intervention or the evaluation.) The results of this study, at a minimum, could impact the extent to which Medicare encourages or discourages clinicians to provide the annual wellness visits and health promotion offerings made available to all 39 million Medicare recipients through the Affordable Care Act. At a maximum, positive results could provide a strategy to moderate the unsustainable increases in the cost of Medicare to the U.S. government. (3)
Read the full article here.
What Works Best in Health Promotion?
Perspectives of the Top Program Managers and Scientists
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Definition of Health Promotion
Health Promotion is the art and science of helping people discover the synergies between their core passions and optimal health, enhancing their motivation to strive for optimal health, and supporting them in changing their lifestyle to move toward a state of optimal health. Optimal health is a dynamic balance of physical, emotional, social, spiritual, and intellectual health. Lifestyle change can be facilitated through a combination of learning experiences that enhance awareness, increase motivation, and build skills and, most important, through the creation of opportunities that open access to environments that make positive health practices the easiest choice.
