Many of us associate preventive care with our annual physical and flu shot vaccinations. However, there’s a lot more to your health and wellness than the occasional booster shot or lecture about eating healthier. When your employees get routine care, their primary care physicians (PCPs) have a better sense of their baseline health and can identify the early warning signs of certain diseases and conditions. It’s also easier to make incremental improvements toward a healthy lifestyle rather than attempt to address a health crisis later on.
At Canopy Health, we believe coordinated care offers the best preventive options. When employees seek preventive treatment and discuss wellness options with an engaged primary care physician (PCP), they can develop strategies the PCP can track to identify the employee’s health issues early on and seamlessly refer them to the right specialists for care. Keep reading to learn why preventive care is essential to your workplace goals!
How Does Preventive Care Improve Workplace Productivity?
Many of your employees’ healthcare costs are linked to preventable conditions like diabetes, heart disease, obesity, and tobacco use. When they take a proactive approach to these conditions, they reduce their likelihood of complications that require intensive treatment or hospitalization. This can reduce both your employees’ out-of-pocket expenses and your healthcare benefit costs. However, preventive care does much more than cut your company’s overall health plan rates.
When your employees are not feeling well, they lose concentration, persistence, and focus. This can result in significant productivity losses and inefficiencies. According to studies, businesses lose millions of dollars every year due to absenteeism and presenteeism (decreased productivity caused by health issues and other factors). One British study reports that presenteeism costs UK business $21 billion each year, and absenteeism adds another $11.8 billion to these losses.
Preventive Care Is Affordable
Most healthcare plans must provide free preventive care services to their members. Under the Affordable Care Act, these essential health benefits include:
- Blood pressure screening
- Blood work and testing for certain high-risk populations
- Depression screening
- Vaccines for influenza, measles, mumps, rubella, pertussis, tetanus, and other conditions
- Certain cancer screenings
For these and other forms of preventive care, your employees are not required to pay a deductible, co-pay, or co-insurance payment. Unfortunately, many employees are unaware that much of their preventive care is free or available at a very low cost.
Canopy Health offers our members tools that help them understand their healthcare costs. Our deductible and out-of-pocket accumulator tools and cost estimators educate our members about their healthcare expenses and empower them to build better budgets. However, as an employer, you also have opportunities to educate your employees.
While open enrollment is a great time to explain your employee benefits packages, you can also provide information about preventive care and its affordability throughout the year. This will not only encourage your employees to use their benefits to their fullest potential but might also improve workplace morale and productivity!
Our Alliance Can Educate Your About Health and Wellness
The Canopy Health alliance of nearly 5,000 physicians, 18 hospitals, and dozens of outpatient care centers encourage preventive care and wellness initiatives for all our members. In addition to our teams of dedicated PCPs who coordinate our members’ healthcare, we offer an array of other tools that promote a proactive approach to health and wellness.
- Video Visits let members consult with a trained medical provider about their non-emergency health needs from anywhere wi-fi is available.
- Our carrier partners offer discounts and programs that encourage healthy lifestyle choices.
- Our alliance members educate members about diet, exercise, mental health, and other issues through their comprehensive class and workshop offerings.
To learn more about these exciting options, contact Canopy Health for more information.
Canopy Health: Committed to a Healthier and More Productive Bay Area
If your company offers an older health plan that does not offer free preventive care services, consider the impact on your employees. Canopy Health’s refreshingly clear, human approach to healthcare encourages meaningful preventive care and offers our members access to some of the most respected medical groups and hospitals within the Bay Area.
References
Higgenbottom, K. (2018, April 20). The price of presenteeism. Forbes. Retrieved from https://www.forbes.com
