Helping employees find health in their lives

For Lisa Bisaccia, head of human resources for CVS Caremark Corp., the rewards of the Fortune 500 company’s wellness program are not about the metrics, the hard data showing productivity gained versus sick days recouped. The reward comes down to the individual stories of lives improved and the sense of accomplishment that comes from it.
“You walk on air when you hear these kinds of stories,” said Bisaccia. “We have a customer service person who by any standards was very overweight. She made the decision to change her life and visited one of our MinuteClinics and consulted with a nurse practitioner. She was put on one our Dash Diets (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) to get her eating healthily, but in a sustainable way. … In 147 days, she lost 47 pounds. Her life is very different now.”
Individual successes aside, the biggest challenge in rolling out this initiative for the 120,000-employee-company was scale. How to message the overarching intent to this many people and have it not come off as a general company directive?
CVS WellRewards program that offers biometric screening and online health-risk assessment program answered the question, overwhelmingly. In three years, it has had a 91 percent engagement level.
“Our philosophy has been to meet people where they are,” said Bisaccia. “By offering choices and information, people can make important life decisions. Whether it’s smoking cessation, exercise, dietary needs, access to information is crucial. And that’s what we’ve been successful in providing.”