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At the Fifth Annual Gibbons Employment & Labor Law Conference, Kelly Ann Bird, a Director in the Gibbons Employment & Labor Law Department, and Cathy Kenworthy, President & CEO of Interactive Health, presented a program titled “Wellness Programs for a Healthy Workplace.”

The discussion covered the “business case for implementing wellness programs in our workplaces,” as well as “the numerous laws impacting such programs.” Highlights:

• “Implementing a wellness program can result in soft dollar and hard dollar benefits, as well as improve workplace culture.  Lowering the cost of health care is just one of the tangible benefits of a wellness program. Employers also see improvements in productivity and work quality and an increased ability to recruit and retain employees. Interactive Health’s data illustrates health improvements in all risk levels by year two of a wellness program.”
• “The business principles associated with what makes for an effective wellness program are the very same principles that are reinforced with emerging case law, rules and the regulatory environment. Interactive Health’s data showed that 95% of the programs implemented among their client base both achieve significant impact and are “green” with regard to legal risk, i.e., they do not cross into any of the issues recently pursued in courts.”
• “As one example, wellness programs with incentives impact participation; the greater the incentive, the greater the participation.”
• “HIPAA and ACA permit rewards and penalties under only certain conditions.”
• “The ADA permits disability-related inquiries or medical examinations only in very limited circumstances, such as in the context of voluntary medical examinations and activities which are part of an employee health program or relative to a bona fide employee benefit plan.”
• “GINA also permits employers to obtain genetic information only in very limited circumstances, similar to the ADA, such as when the employee voluntary provides the information or in the context of a group health plan that offers a wellness program.”