Sleep deprivation negatively impacts your body, mind, and overall health in ways that might surprise you. Read five reasons why hitting the snooze button may not be such a bad idea, after all!

A new spin on "working out" your issues.

Tired of the same old fitness routine? Give your motivation and focus a boost with Eastern exercise. These three techniques are shown to align body and mind to produce better health and fitness benefits.

How to avoid exercise-related injuries.

Break through your fears and get into the game!

Is buying fresh really worth the extra money? How to put nutritious food on the table without breaking the bank.

An 8-step guide to rebuild your body image and improve your overall health.

Tips for healthy grocery shopping.

Forget fast food! There are plenty of quick, easy and healthy recipes that will power you and your family throughout your busy week. Inside, BHS shares two of our favorites!

We can all benefit from making positive changes to our nutrition. After all, everyone eats! Get involved with National Nutrition Month today - We've included 3 ideas to get you started.

Prevent heart disease by leading a heart-healthy lifestyle. Incorporate these five strategies into your routine to help protect your heart today!

Consuming these 18 foods on a regular basis can boost your heart health. The kicker: You're probably already eating some of them!

How job stress can affect your heart's health, and what you can do about it.

These little-known "Ticker Tidbits" may surprise you!

Did you know that sedentary lifestyle is one of the TOP risk factors for heart disease? Fortunately, this is a risk factor that you can change. Take control today – It’s time to get your heart pumping!

The 19th Annual Healthy Weight Week is January 15 - 21, 2012.

Whether you prefer a low-fat, low-carb or all-cheeseburger diet, our tips will help you to curb unhealthy habits and reach a healthy weight.

Lose weight? Check. Start exercising? Check. Stop smoking? Check.

Happy New Year! With a new year, comes new opportunity for healthy change. Read our tips on how to make your resolutions stick in 2012.

New members to the BHS team highlighted in BBJ's People on the Move!

With cold, comes fun! Read our tips on the most enjoyale ways to stay active this season.

Did you know that nearly 1 in 4 people have more headaches during the holidays than any other time of the year? Read our tips on how to manage holiday headaches – and even better, how to prevent them from happening in the first place.

National Hand Washing Awareness Week is December 4 - December 10.

Who says you can't have your cheesecake and eat it, too? Our tips and ideas can show you how to fully enjoy all the festivities that the holidays have to offer - minus the unwanted calories or weight gain.

The holiday shopping season is in full swing! Not sure what to get for the loved ones on your list? This year, give the greatest gift of all: The gift of better health.

Diabetes Prevention: Knowing Your Risk is Half the Battle
When it comes to lowering your chances of developing diabetes, knowing your risk is half the battle.  Considering the following list of health risk factors from WebMD can be a great first step towards preventing diabetes.

Secrets to eating smart and really enjoying your Thanksgiving meal without feeling guilty. Click Here for Secrets

Serve up a fresh approach to healthy eating this Thanksgiving; try this turkey gravy recipe that has all of the taste, but less fat, calories and sodium! Click Here for Recipe

The American Cancer Society is marking the 36th Great American Smokeout on November 17 by encouraging smokers to use the date to make a plan to quit, or to plan in advance and quit smoking that day.  By doing so, smokers will be taking an important step towards a healthier life – one that can lead to reducing cancer risk.

The information and professional assistance available in this quick reference guide allows you to choose the help that best fits your needs. 

Which method will you choose?  Click Here! 

When it comes to type 2 diabetes (the most common type of diabetes) prevention is a big deal.  It is especially important to make diabetes prevention a priority if you're at increased risk of diabetes - For example, if you're overweight or have a family history of the disease.

Join our Free Webinar: Wednesday, November 2nd @ 10am, Organizational development strategist, Gina Barton, reveals how to increase your organization's effectiveness, health and viability.

Register Today: Click Here!

Congratulations to the 2011 Baltimore Business Journal Healthiest Companies Finalists and Winners!

June is Great Outdoors Month, a time to celebrate the beauty of the earth, and to get active outside.  Getting active has many health benefits, including lowering blood pressure, increasing bone and muscle strength, and managing weight. Not to mention it can be (gasp!) FUN! Outdoor activities can range from the simple, like taking a walk, to the challenging, such as rafting or climbing. No matter what you do, you will feel good being in the open air, and enjoying the great outdoors.

Join Business Health Services' (BHS) President and CEO, Dawn Motovidlak as she discusses how to sell corporate wellness programs to the C-suite.

 

 

 

 

Randi Bauernshub, Northeast Regional Director for Business Health Services will be giving a webinar on Effective Communication Strategies for Wellness Programs hosted by PEBA, the Benefits and Compensation Association.

One month after the tsunami and earthquake in Japan on March 11, 2011, officials have begun to compare the nuclear disaster that it created will reach levels comparable to the 1986 Chernobyl explosion (see the New York Times article here). The potential widespread environmental and health effects that come attached to that announcement makes recognizing Earth Day, celebrated on April 22, even more important. 

This blog is submitted by Doug Nelson, Director of Client Relations, Washington Metro Area. Enjoy!

Could you imagine playing an athletic game such as basketball and not keeping score? If you said ‘yes,’ I bet that you are a woman. If you said, “no way!” I bet you are a guy. And no, I am not the type of person who would ever put down one sex or another.
 

The Washington Post’s Leonard Bernstein recently wrote an article profiling a DC Metro area women’s basketball league that does not keep score in their league games. They have refused to since they first formed in 1991.

Join Business Health Services' (BHS) Director of Client Relations, Doug Nelson as he discusses how to overcome the challenges of engaging men in Corporate Wellness Programs.

Webinar guests will learn:

• Why competition-focused challenges and/or sporting events pay off when it comes to men.
• How to integrate Men's Health Discussions and how to get the guys to show up
• Why the catchphrase "know your numbers" - has been used on ESPN to engage men in wellness programs.

Baltimore City deserves to be applauded for taking proactive steps to help their low-income residents access healthier foods via their new Virtual Super Market Project . The program, named Baltimarket enables residents to place orders for fresh groceries and pick them up at their local library.

 

The program addresses issues that commonly prevent the city’s low-income residents from accessing healthy food and which has contributed to an obesity epidemic that is especially high among their income group.

 

Recent research has shown that males earning more than $100K a year are the least likely to participate in corporate wellness programs. Unfortunately, this group often also acts as the upper management of a corporation. As a result, securing the sustained attention and active participation of this group is even more important because they are in positions of leadership and can serve as role models for the program. Although gaining their participation can be challenging, if you can do it, the positive impact on your program is more than worth the effort. An increase in program utilization, the support needed to establish a lasting culture of wellness, and a healthier and a more productive workforce are just a few of examples of how you can reap rewards. Here are a few strategies that some of the most successful wellness programs have used to reach upper management:

We finally got our hands on Dawn's Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year Award Finalist video. Check it out!

 

 

This blog is from our wellness coach, Alicia, in recognition of National Heart Health month. 

February is national hearth health month. The heart is our most vital organ, but how many of us actually understand how amazing the organ is?  To keep us alive, this muscular little pump, about the size of a closed fist, expands and contracts 100,000 times a day, pumping about 2,000 gallons of blood throughout our bodies every 24 hours. However, as amazing an organ it is, it also has vulnerabilities. 

Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Resources released the new 2010 Dietary Guidelines. Every five years, by law, the two departments, along with the input from a wide range of experts and the general public, produce the government’s official position on what and how Americans should eat. 

Tom Vilsack, the US Secretary of Agriculture, summed up the recommendations contained in the report: “If folks want to maintain a healthy weight, they have to be sensitive to the calories in and calories out. Americans also should swap out calorie-ridden foods that are high in fats and sugars, replacing them with ‘nutrient-dense’ alternatives such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains and low-fat milk products. Not every calorie is the same.” 

Join Business Health Services' (BHS) Director of Client Relations, Sandi Cunningham as she discusses the benefits of merging Wellness and EAP services to offer your employees the TOTAL wellness.

The food industry made news last week by introducing a new food labeling initiative called Nutrition Keys. The initiative encourages food companies to place nutrition labeling on the front of the box and to use a new standard label which highlights key nutritional data. The labeling effort was undertaken in response to the climbing obesity rates in the U.S. However, some critics are calling the new labels a “preemptive strike,” claiming that the food industry did this to avoid having to abide by new nutrition labeling standards that the FDA has been working on. 

If I have learned anything during the years I have spent creating corporate wellness programs, it is that in corporate wellness, one size definitely does not fit all. In today’s rapidly changing, dynamic and hyper-competitive environment, companies come in all sizes, shapes and configurations. It is our job as creative providers to design and deliver programs that are accessible, engaging and effective. This includes figuring out how to reach and engage employees who are often traveling, working in different company locations or working remotely. Below are some strategies to overcome location fatale. 

Stop! Take a 3-minute break from whatever you are doing and read this blog!
 
Our brains, eyes and bodies all seem to be over-worked and exhausted these days.  In order to operate at peak efficiency, each of these systems needs to have the chance to rest and recuperate on a frequent basis. Researchers and efficiency experts have shown that allowing ourselves to work to the point of exhaustion over a long period can have serious effects on our energy levels and our overall health. In fact, in many countries in the developed world, the law actually requires that employers provide regular breaks for their employees for their own protection and safety.

This post is written by Rachelle, a BHS Wellness Coach

Last summer, I was riding the Washington DC Metro during rush hour and saw a man standing in the middle of the train surrounded by a group of people trying hard to not stare at his feet. The man, who was dressed in a suit, was wearing what looked like toe socks. As I wondered why this man was wearing just his socks on the metro, I looked closer and I saw that these “toe socks” also had a rubber sole on the bottom. Later that night, being the fitness geek I am, I eagerly prowled the web to figure out just what it was that I had seen the man sporting on his feet.

As 2010 comes to a close, we find ourselves once again in the midst of the season of giving. Every year managers and executives try to find a rational balance between budgetary constraint and demonstrating the proper gift-giving spirit for employees. I am sure that, like me, you have tried everything from company parties, to gift cards, to cash bonuses, gourmet gift baskets and dozens of other solutions for the company gift-giving dilemma. 

However, as a leader you are in a unique position to give your employees some less tangible, but very meaningful gifts.

An internal Wellness Committee is often an important and useful component of a corporate wellness initiative as it can provide opportunities for both management and employee involvement in the development and promotion of the program. A well-formulated and smoothly functioning Wellness Committee can serve a range of important functions including:

Developing and promoting the organization’s health and wellness brands and themes Creating a sense of employee ownership in the program Ensuring inputs from a broad range of company stakeholders and perspectives Providing a source of internal support and advocacy for the program   Helping to drive employee enthusiasm and participation Below are four important elements to consider when organizing your Wellness Committee.

Leadership:  

The committee chair should be selected...

Ccorporate wellness has not been around nearly as long as Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) have. As a result, unlike EAPs, it is often difficult to find hard, statistical evidence supporting corporate wellness and the various implementation strategies. And it is especially rare, that the evidence examines multiple wellness programs, across different industries. But as Bob Dylan’s famous song goes, “times, they are a-changing.” 

As a CEO myself, I understand how hard it is for executives and senior managers to have to constantly choose from among the dozens of demands for their time, money, and resources. But in order for a wellness program to truly succeed, securing upper management support and engagement is necessary. Yet, many senior managers and executives, without the appropriate knowledge on corporate wellness are prone to viewing a wellness program as simply a “nice benefit” that may garner their support during the rare and brief periods of financial prosperity and business calm. So how do you get past this? 

In this day and age, it is often hard to sift through all of the content that the web offers to find helpful (and trustworthy!) tools for our bodies. In an effort to help, we decided to begin a series of blog posts dedicated to having our coaches and counselors recommend online sites for all things related to physical and mental wellness. One of our Wellness Coaches, Alicia, volunteered to write our first one on nutrition. Happy reading!

Our first post is on nutrition because it is currently the topic of choice for our own employees in our internal wellness program (indeed, in our company “Wellness Interest Survey” one employee even asked if it might be possible for us to outfit them with a personal chef! Luckily they settled for a group cooking demonstration instead).

Engaging employees in Employee Assistance Programs (EAPs) or Corporate Wellness Programs is often much easier than their household members. This is because you have easy access to them. The office kitchen, bathrooms, and mailboxes become free billboard space for flyers and posters. Access to work email addresses enable certified delivery of news right to their fingertips  - outreach, newsletters, and tip sheets can all be easily sent and their delivery ensured. Employees also often visit the company portal for work related matters where their attention can be captured  with prominently displayed announcements on the employee portal.

Household members, however, are another story.

We receive a lot of questions from clients about the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). But with violations of the law resulting in penalties such as an excise tax of $100 per day, per effected individual, it is no wonder companies are worried about compliance.