Health Technology
Article | September 12, 2023
Delve into the EHR tools reshaping the healthcare industry for an efficient and patient-centric future. Unlock streamlined workflows and data-driven decision-making through these EHR software tools.
Adopting an EHR tool has become crucial for clinics and healthcare providers striving to revolutionize their operations and deliver a high standard of care. These innovative EHR software tools possess the potential to transform healthcare workflows, enabling clinics to optimize processes, streamline operations, and provide an exceptional level of care to patients. From facilitating seamless communication and improving operational efficiency to enhancing patient satisfaction, EHR tools unlock possibilities for improved operations, accurate claims processing, and enhanced financial management within practices.
This article explores the top 10 electronic health record tools that are reshaping the healthcare industry and paving the way for a more efficient and patient-centric future.
1. Avalon EHR
It is an EHR evaluation tool that prioritizes robust physician-patient engagement, setting it apart from complex electronic health record (EHR) systems. With an unwavering focus on reliability and security, Avalon offers a cutting-edge solution for the future of healthcare. Its key features include CureMD's clinical overview, which presents alarms, trends, and patient histories on a single screen, ensuring comprehensive insights. The platform also boasts a specialized rheumatology section with templates for typical symptoms, simplifying documentation processes. Furthermore, Avalon provides regular updates for various medical specialties following CPT and ICD codes, ensuring compliance, proper medical procedures, and diagnosis recording. Notably, it supports automated overnight transcription of dictations into templates, significantly reducing the time and billing service partners' costs associated with finding and documenting clinical findings.
2. AdvancedBiller
The AdvancedBiller Grow program offers medical billing companies a comprehensive and advantageous solution, combining industry-leading software solutions with exclusive partner benefits. This program is designed to drive optimal outcomes by providing a unified practice management workflow, excellent support, free promotional opportunities, and competitive, scalable pricing. With a focus on boosting performance and profitability, AdvancedBiller equips businesses with the necessary tools to excel in their field. The program features custom health plans that assist doctors in managing individual patient needs based on age, sex, and lab findings. Additionally, it offers customizable note-taking templates to align with specific workflows and preferences. This EHR tool also facilitates telemedicine appointments, enabling patients to communicate face-to-face with their doctors and receive important notifications. Furthermore, the program enhances data management by allowing doctors to save sensitive information and screenshots during conference calls securely. By leveraging the AdvancedBiller Grow program, medical billing companies can optimize operations, deliver superior care, and achieve notable success.
3. Halemind
EHR integration tools, such as Halemind, present a game-changing solution that enables clinics to elevate their operations and provide superior patient care. This comprehensive platform offers many features, including appointment scheduling, patient registrations, check-ins, consultations, prescriptions, billing, and reporting, all aimed at delivering a seamless customer experience. With Halemind, clinics can transform their business and scale up their operations. The platform also provides specialized functionalities for pharmacies, allowing real-time access to customer histories, order tracking, invoicing, and supplier management. In addition, hospitals can benefit from Halemind's capabilities, such as operations planning, invoicing, payment collection, patient sample tracking, and customizable data display. Medical facilities can further enhance their efficiency by utilizing its in-patient module for managing wards, rooms, and beds and generating discharge reports.
4. SIMPLEX HIMES Patient Portal
SIMPLEX HIMES software incorporates an optional yet powerful feature, the Patient Portal and Mobile Application, designed to revolutionize patient engagement and communication. This EHR tool seamlessly integrates with existing websites, providing healthcare facilities with a comprehensive EHR tool to enhance the patient experience. The Patient Portal enables efficient control of patient intake, bed availability monitoring, operating room scheduling, and centralized patient demographic management within hospitals. The software streamlines operations for pathology labs by managing information about referral laboratories, generating barcodes for sample tracing, and delivering timely test result alerts via email or text. Additionally, patients benefit from self-service portals, empowering them to conveniently schedule appointments, access medical records, locate service provider locations, and communicate with their doctors.
5. Patient Engagement
The Patient Engagement tool offers patients unparalleled access to their personal health information, visit summaries, and lab results, empowering them to take an active role in their healthcare journey. With the help of this EHR tool, patients can conveniently book appointments online using the healow Open Access feature, efficiently manage their medications, and engage in secure messaging with their healthcare providers. In addition, the eCW software utilized within the tool provides organized data capture, trend analysis, and customizable documentation options for various healthcare specialties. Clinicians can effortlessly retrieve any aspect of the patient record through the Patient Hub, ensuring complete and efficient access to vital information. Furthermore, eClinicalWorks Version 11 introduces Eva, a computer program that assists physicians in evaluating patient records, leveraging details from the Progress Note tool and data flowsheets. This advanced functionality enhances clinical decision-making and promotes efficient patient care.
6. Electronic Prescription
The Electronic Prescription tool revolutionizes prescription management in the healthcare industry, offering a seamless and efficient solution for healthcare providers. This advanced software streamlines the prescription process by eliminating traditional prescription pads, enhancing convenience and accuracy. AllegianceMD, integrated within the tool, enables patients to fill out their history and demographic information online within defined clinic limits, facilitating seamless integration of patient information. This EHR tool encompasses a range of features, including an active/inactive medicine list, e-refill requests, an allergy list, and comprehensive drug interaction checks. The software also includes a lab module for efficiently tracking test results and follow-ups. With its extended functionalities, the Electronic Prescription tool elevates prescription management, promoting patient safety and enhancing workflow efficiency for healthcare providers.
7. Telehealth
WRS Health Telehealth offers healthcare providers and patients a secure and reliable virtual care experience. With seamless integration into the electronic health record (EHR), this comprehensive telehealth platform provides a single platform for managing virtual patient encounters. Designed with ease of use in mind, both patients and providers can navigate the user-friendly interface effortlessly. This EHR comparison tool is a safe alternative to in-office visits, offering private and secure online consultations that comply with HIPAA regulations. This telehealth solution ensures a smooth and efficient workflow with its seamless integration of clinical and revenue cycle management (RCM) functionalities.
8. Practice Management for Billing Companies
The Practice Management tool offered by SequelMed is a comprehensive solution that streamlines operations and enhances efficiency in healthcare practices. This advanced tool automates various tasks, including billing, claim processing, revenue management & clinical procedures, and generates analytical reports for comprehensive insights, with the option of bundled or separate programs for electronic health records and practice management. The software provides interoperability with imaging systems and medical equipment through HL7 and DICOM interfaces, offering flexibility in deployment options with on-site or cloud hosting. In addition to its core functionalities, it enhances patient engagement with real-time communication, online patient registration, active prescription lists, immunization schedules, and a patient portal. The Practice Management Tool simplifies computerized prescription processes and promotes connectivity across healthcare systems, enabling healthcare providers to optimize their operations and deliver efficient, patient-centered care.
9. Medical Practice Management Software
The Practice Management Software offers healthcare providers a powerful solution to streamline operations, ensure accurate claims processing, and expedite reimbursement cycles. With its intuitive design and comprehensive features, this software empowers practices to take control of their operations and optimize efficiency. Users can benefit from the HIPAA-compliant claims clearinghouse provided by NueMD, allowing for the seamless processing of unlimited claims. The software makes it easier to submit paper claims by reducing it to a single click, and it also simplifies payment transactions by incorporating credit card processing. Additionally, the ONC-ATCB-certified EHR enhances clinical workflow by providing charting capabilities, e-prescribing, laboratory report monitoring, and secure fax management.
10. LiquidEHR
LiquidEHR is a cloud-based electronic health record (EHR) solution ideal for small and midsize optometry practices. It offers a range of features to manage medical records, scheduling, and billing effectively. The software includes specialized tools specific to optometry, such as historical IOP charts, drawing tools, built-in eye charts, frames data integration, and image management. Clinicians using LiquidEHR have access to electronic insurance filing tools, patient recalls, drug interactions and allergy checks, problem lists, medication recommendations, educational resources, vital signs monitoring, and more. The system also ensures data security through access controls, audit logs, and encryption features.
Future Scope
By staying informed about the top EHR tools highlighted in this article, medical practitioners can unlock streamlined workflows, improved communication, and data-driven decision-making to optimize clinical practices and deliver exceptional patient care. The future of EHR assessment tools looks promising, with emerging trends like artificial intelligence, machine learning, interoperability, and telehealth shaping the way forward. By embracing these advancements, healthcare professionals can stay ahead of the curve, maximize operational efficiency, and position themselves for success in the healthcare industry.
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Health Technology, Digital Healthcare
Article | August 21, 2023
What is Healthcare Digital Marketing
Digital marketing is a new wave in the world of healthcare marketing strategy. Using advanced technologies that use online marketing platforms such as websites, social media channels, and SEO techniques, to reach potential clients with healthcare products and services encompasses healthcare digital marketing.
Digital marketing in the healthcare sector makes it easier to create, communicate, and deliver health information and make interventions regarding protecting and promoting the health of diverse populations.
Strategies for Healthcare Digital Marketing
There are many trending healthcare digital marketing strategies you can use beneficially in healthcare, but here are the top 10 trending strategies that can help you ensure success:
Create a Wholesome Patient Experience on Your Website
As part of effective healthcare digital marketing for your services, crafting a patient-focused website will help to provide a seamless experience for visitors. While it is important to create a website that you can optimize for search engines, it is also crucial to simplify the process for first-time as well as repeat visitors. Use a conversational tone and features that allow easy navigation so that patients don’t feel like they are being bombarded with medical jargon.
Take a look at Mayo Clinic’s homepage. A patient's needs like online scheduling, specialist lookup, and contact information are easily available, while secondary information for those who would like to explore more before they make an appointment is below. This user-friendly healthcare digital marketing strategy will help you a lot in making visitors return to your website, and when they are looking for products and services.
Employ a Responsive Web Design
With more people leaving the confines of PCs to use the web easily and comfortably, ensuring that your website is responsive to various types of devices is paramount. This applies more to mobile devices because Google has introduced mobile-first indexing in September 2020.
Branding Matters
If you want to use healthcare digital marketing campaigns efficiently you have to identify what your organization as a brand can give patients. Even if it is healthcare, where target markets and organizational priorities are almost similar, patients need differentiating factors for each healthcare provider. If you don’t want a patient to be lost in the sea of white coats, figuring out what is special about what you can offer is crucial. Make sure your organizational goals and healthcare digital marketing goals are in sync to avoid unnecessary expenditure. Analyze your competition and let that assist you in shaping the path that your healthcare digital marketing strategy will take. You can often learn a lot from a competitor’s mistakes.
Provide Blog Content That Is Optimized for SEO
Symptom-related searches constitute 1% of all searches, that’s millions, on Google. Use this information to your benefit when planning your editorial calendar for blogs and include it efficiently in your healthcare digital marketing strategy. While you plan around national health observances, you can integrate long-tail keywords, provide links to reputed health sites and articles within your website, and invest in healthcare digital marketing plans. The four to five listings that show at the top of Google’s organic search results page are called the local pack—this part is vital for mobile users because it is all the screen can display before the user scrolls down. If you haven’t already, you should claim your healthcare website on Google My Business and keep it updated. Apart from this, healthcare digital content marketing plans need to be optimized for healthcare-specific SEO keywords.
Supplement Blogs with Video Content
With more algorithms prioritizing video content, you don’t want to be left behind without any good video content. In the healthcare industry, you have the added benefit of adding to your physician’s credibility if you create edutainment videos telling patients about their area of expertise. Healthcare video marketing can help you leverage the physicians in your organization that are authorities in their respective fields of medicine. Long and scary procedures being described by certified physicians is often reassuring for patients. Likewise, patient testimonials can pay this comforting reassurance forward, resulting in building a good reputation for your organization through similar healthcare digital marketing approaches.
Take Advantage of Paid Advertising
After you’ve created all this carefully crafted content that is optimized for SEO, you can’t just let it sit only on your website. Sometimes even if you maintain up-to-date business listings, Google’s local pack is overshadowed by paid ads. You have to promote it on search engines and social media platforms through pay-per-click (PPC), search, targeted, and display ads. Here you need a clear healthcare digital marketing strategy. Call-only campaigns and other ad extensions can be used to promote the services you offer as well.
Leverage Social Media
While organic social media campaigns are great, they can only get you so far. Using it as your only social media strategy can only give you subpar results compared to paid social campaigns. A paid social media plan is more than just clicking on ‘boost’, you have to create a strategy that suits your goals, targets the audience you need, and budgets for a specific ROI. You can create highly personalized campaigns without wasting your budget and reach the patients who are most likely to find your posts useful. It can be quite advantageous if you use healthcare social media marketing to your benefit while being tasteful in what you post. A healthcare care social media platform can be included in your healthcare digital marketing strategy.
Set up an Email Strategy
In healthcare, there are a few types of emails you can take advantage of, like reminders for appointments and annual physicals, seasonal tips for flu season, and announcements about new technology being used in your organization. Letting opportunities like these slip by is lost chances to keep patients engaged with your services and your patients also lose out on information that potentially could have been useful to them. Including a well-planned email marketing strategy as a part of your healthcare digital marketing plan will prevent patients from marking your email as spam and give you good open rates. Setting up free subscription-based newsletters as Johns Hopkins Medicine does allows you to prevent unnecessary unsubscribes as well.
Follow-up with Patient Reviews and Feedback
Word-of-mouth referrals have and always will be a part of marketing and healthcare digital marketing can help you evaluate the quality of the referrals you are getting. Patient success stories often inspire and evoke emotional responses from people, apart from serving as a way to show others the quality of the healthcare services you provide.
Track Your Healthcare Digital Marketing Strategies
After you’ve put all this effort into creating healthcare digital marketing strategies for email, social, and video you have to analyze where your budget is being spent the most, and whether it is reaping you the kind of benefits you are expecting. Understanding and capitalizing on patient micro-moments allows you to position your brand appropriately so that you are right there when they need your services. Measuring and studying your healthcare digital marketing conversion metrics is highly beneficial when it comes to using your resources to serve your needs best.
It doesn’t hurt to track all the mediums you’re using to communicate with patients including calls that are made to your front desk. Analyzing this data can help you understand the blockers that lie in the path between a patient and doctor. A laggy scheduling system, long call-hold times, and patient misinformation are just some of the revelations this analysis can bring to light.
Trends in Healthcare Digital Marketing
Healthcare digital marketing plans were almost non-existent, but they slowly developed to include traditional marketing like print, direct mail, television, and radio. The limitations of these media can now be overcome with healthcare digital marketing.
Doctor reviews, patient discussion forums, and physician certifications and availability are now an online search away for most patients. On-demand healthcare is becoming increasingly popular, and big data is playing a pivotal role in decreasing errors via patient record analyses and creating preventative plans for recurring emergency room patients.
The future even holds possibilities for telesurgeries, telemedicine continues to grow, and virtual patient treatment and other emerging technologies are changing the landscape of healthcare digital marketing. High-risk patients are being aided by heart rate sensors, oximeters, and exercise trackers paving the way for increased investment in medical devices that can be worn. These devices give people a sense of agency when it comes to their health while creating room for gamification and considerable changes in healthcare insurance. Even with all these innovative changes, for healthcare digital marketers, one aspect will remain primary and this is the patient.
Gone are the days when healthcare costs were affordable and patients were not proactive in researching which healthcare provider to choose. The modern patient has to be prudent in selecting the person responsible for improving their health, and it is your responsibility as a marketer to show them why your organization is the best. Stay updated with the latest healthcare digital marketing trends with webinars as the times are changing faster than ever.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is healthcare digital marketing?
Marketing healthcare products and services with the use of advanced digital technologies and techniques are called healthcare digital marketing. These techniques can be Google AdWords campaigns, responsive websites, SEO tactics, mobile apps, unique landing pages, social media campaigns, and email marketing programs, and much more.
Why is digital marketing important in healthcare?
Healthcare providers are facing challenges everywhere, especially in marketing their products and services. So, as technology is evolving, to stay competitive and continue improving the patient experience, the healthcare industry should invest in healthcare digital marketing strategies.
What is a healthcare marketing strategy?
Healthcare marketing strategies support and promote the practices of healthcare providers and telemedicine providers. Healthcare digital marketing strategy includes many channels and forms to target the right patients in the right way at the right time.
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Health Technology, Digital Healthcare
Article | September 8, 2023
Workers in the healthcare industry are among the most burned out demographics following the COVID-19 pandemic. In fact, a report by Medscape on physician burnout and depression in 2022 calculated a five-percentage point increase in burnout overall, from 42% in 2020 to 47% in 2021. Critical care physician burnout was also found to increase from 44% to 51% last year, placing them at the top of Maryville University’s list of physician specialties with the highest cases of burnout. This is closely followed by rheumatology physician burnout, which was 50% in 2021. At the bottom of the list, emergency medicine physician burnout still came in close at a rate of 44%.
Burnout can result in, among other things, exhaustion and a loss of concentration, which can be dangerous in healthcare. With that, advancements in technology have been made to help mitigate stress and reduce the chances of burnout in healthcare.
Maximum Tasks, Minimum Efficiency
Reports show that many technological advancements in the healthcare industry actually aren’t appropriate for managing physician workloads. This is due to the range of tasks physicians need to perform, from creating treatment plans to managing EHRs. Our previous discussion on EHR-Generated Messages highlighted how the misapplication of this algorithm had actually led to these inboxes getting clogged. This has primary care physicians spending more than half their workday interacting with EHRs that only remind physicians to order certain tests, instead of dealing with critical messages from patients or colleagues. This has been counterproductive in terms of efficiency, leading to more burnout symptoms and the tendency to reduce clinical work hours. It is therefore important that technology integrations consistently consider the broader picture of the tasks of physicians.
Tech Developments for Reducing Burnout
Shifts in the industry have thus begun to focus on the quality of efficiency and physician assistance, rather than the quantity of technology available. Here are some notable examples of technology that has become finely integrated within the healthcare industry.
Ambient Technology in Clinical Documentation
Ambient computing streamlines the clinical documentation process by using artificial intelligence to respond to human behavior and needs. This provides front-end speech and computer-assisted documentation, reducing the time needed for physicians to work on admin tasks, and thereby minimizing burnout. Smart hospitals have started leveraging this through sensor-based solutions, and experts from Michigan University believe usage must be made easier and simpler to use for the provider if the healthcare industry is to further leverage ambient computing for CDI. As of 2021, adoption has only started to take off, especially in the revenue cycle.
Computer Modeling in Vaccine Development
The traditional process of designing novel vaccines usually lasts 10 to 15 years and can cost between $200 million and $500 million. However, a feature by News Medical highlights the recent development of COVID-19 vaccines, which uncovered the capabilities of computational modeling systems. This showed an ability to predict which parts of a pathogen may be recognized by the immune system’s B cells and T cells. This allows rapid identification of vaccine targets from a genetic sequence, which reduces the years required for preclinical research. Physicians are thus able to respond faster to vaccine developments, and reduce the overload of health systems during any future pandemics or epidemics in the long term.
Patient Placement Technology
The shortage of physicians is a common setback in the industry, one that staff at the Rice County District Hospital in Lyons, Kansas mitigated using patient placement technology. Patient placement technology coordinated care for patients inside the 25-bed, level 4 hospital, as well as those needing to be transferred to another facility. By integrating local EMS and other transport services with health systems, manual telephone calls were no longer necessary. Hence, physicians were able to quickly and effectively get patients the care they needed while managing time-critical diagnoses. This maximizes the limited resources available without stretching out the workforce. Physicians are able to focus solely on their patients, knowing that the time-consuming logistics are being efficiently handled by technology. The industry needs to continue to look into the practices of reducing burnout among physicians, more so as we continue to recover from the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. By emphasizing physician wellness and efficient technology, we can continue to assure the health and productivity of healthcare workers into the future.
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Future of Healthcare
Article | December 8, 2020
Let’s face it. It’s been one tough year with too many of us sitting idle and indulging in calorie-laden foods for way too long as the coronavirus pandemic continues to sweep the globe. For all too many, sheltering in place has prompted unwelcome weight gain—a troublesome truth as we head into the holiday season where gluttony oft reigns supreme.
That said, many individuals did have foresight and motivation back in March and the months that followed, wisely leveraging that extreme downtime to “diet for dollars” with HealthyWage—a pioneer of money-driven weight loss contests and challenges for individuals, teams and business groups. In fact, those who started a 6-month HealthyWager challenge during the pandemic (late March through May) broke company records, spurring a dramatic increase in pound shedding success rates—and in-kind cash payouts—against the norm. So motivated became America to drop, or avoid, the so-called ‘quarantine 15’ and score some cold hard cash in the process, HealthyWage reports that this past May it logged a substantial year-over-year increase in challenge participants at large. This is not surprising given Google search trends indicates the portion of people searching for weight loss hit a 5-year high in May of 2020—a level even exceeding the quintessential New Year’s diet resolution season.
Beyond the fact that people who started weight loss wagers during the pandemic achieved much greater success as compared to participant results the prior year, and earning hundreds and even thousands of dollars for their efforts, it is women and individuals under 30 years of age primarily accounting for the sustained increases. For example, among the litany of pandemic era success stories, Lisa S. won over $1,900 for losing 50 pounds in 6 months while Hayden T. won over $1,200 for losing over 62 pounds in 6 months—both during the COVID-19 pandemic.
As the coronavirus rages on well into the fourth quarter, we collectively find ourselves again having to shelter-in-place. Those trying to reconcile how they will survive this next round of being home bound, and the holiday season at large, with mitigated waistline and budgetary wreckage—and who are even planning their New Year resolution approach just beyond—would be wise to consider the gamified dieting approach. “Loss Aversion is a powerful dynamic and the reality of having ‘skin in the game’ can propel the results of a gamified weight loss initiative,” notes HealthyWage co-founder David Roddenberry.
The efficacy of diet gamification is well-proven. For one, according to study findings published by JAMA Internal Medicine, behavioral economics-based gamification led to “significantly” increased physical activity among overweight and obese Americans. In this particular study, pairing a step tracking device with social incentives led to sustained, long-term behavior change—prompting participants to take more steps then with a step tracking device, alone. While the report explains that “gamification interventions significantly increased physical activity during the 24-week intervention,” with competition being the “most effective.”
That’s something HealthyWage has seen play out since launching its weight-loss gamification platform in 2009. HealthyWage is, in fact, founded on earlier substantive research and "double-incentivization" methodology that proves competition and rewards—especially the cash variety—can as much as triple the effectiveness of weight loss programs.
“A key element for the success of a gamification program is giving participants something to lose if they fail to meet their goal—whether tangible or intangible,” notes Roddenberry. “In this particular study, it was just points at stake but even this effected behavior change. There are actually throngs of studies demonstrated that the threat of losing something of value is much more effective than the opportunity to win something of equal value. That’s precisely why we advocate that program participants ‘pay to play’ and make an investment out of their own pocket in order to win rewards—in our case large cash prizes—for losing weight and getting more active in the program.”
A few other notable HealthyWager success stories (both female and male) are case-in-point. These include Jean N. who lost 71 lbs. and won $3,357.99 for her efforts, and Jeremy M. who also lost 71 lbs. and won $1,886.32 for his own slimdown success. From its website, HealthyWage.com shares yet more inspirational success stories of both women and men who gained financially for their pound-shedding achievements using the company’s unique gamification approach. This includes Kristin W. who lost a staggering 114 pounds and won $4,000 for her efforts, Anastasia W. who lost 41 pounds and won a whopping $10,000 in kind, and Blake S. who lost an impressive 151 pounds and won $4,670 for his own slimdown success. Figures that are tasty, indeed.
These and other such HealthyWage payouts are proof positive. For their weight-loss achievements that collectively exceeds an astounding 1,050,000 pounds for this year, alone—269 of which losing in excess of 100 pounds (and nearly 7.5 million pounds lost since the company’s launch), HealthyWage has reportedly paid more than xx30,000 dieters over $13 million cash in 2020, specifically, and over $55 million cash since its inception in 2009.
HealthyWage programs apply these principles:
HealthyWager Challenge: participants commit to a weight loss goal and an upfront financial payment and get their money back plus a financial return if they accomplish their weight loss goal. The average participant loses 40.7 pounds and gets paid $1,245.
HealthyWage Step Challenge: participants commit money and agree to increase their steps by 25% over 60-days. If they achieve their goal they get their money back plus the money from those who don't hit their goal.
Upholding the new findings while also further validating HealthyWage’s well-honed approach, an additional study published in the journal Social Science and Medicine continue to prove that money is an effective motivator to “increase both the magnitude and duration of weight loss.” The same hold true in business for staff wellness initiatives. Results from one study published in the Annals of Internal Medicine indicated that “Loss Incentive’ Motivates Employees to Take More Steps ,” finding that financial incentives framed as a loss were most effective for achieving physical activity goals.
As a prolific corporate and group wellness purveyor, since 2009 HealthyWage has worked with an array of hi-caliber participants on workplace and staff wellness initiatives, including Halliburton, ConocoPhillips and more than 25% of the largest school districts in the country. HealthyWage has, in fact, formally created competitive, money-motivated programs for more than 1000 Fortune 500 and other public and private companies, hospitals, health systems, insurers, school systems, municipal governments and other organizations throughout the U.S., and their program has been more informally run at more than 7,000 companies and organizations seeking to bolster staff health and well-being, and boost bottom lines in kind.
“Throngs of studies reiterate the importance of the 'stick' in the design of a wellness incentive program, whether for individuals at home or for employee groups,” Roddenberry says. “Many studies have demonstrated that the threat of losing something of value is much more effective than the opportunity to win something of equal value. That’s precisely why we advocate that program participants ‘pay to play’ and make an investment out of their own pocket in order to win rewards—in our case large cash prizes—for losing weight and getting more active in the program.”
Studies do consistently show that monetary incentives serve to enhance the effectiveness of, and duly complement, weight-loss programs of any and all sorts, especially when paid out quickly like HealthyWage’s various programs. For its part, HealthyWage reports that the average participant more than doubles their investment if they are successful at achieving their goal. The financial upside potential is impressive.
So, if this is the season when you would like to not only resolve to lose those extra lbs. but also actually achieve that worthy goal, consider a cash-fueled approach. It just might give you that extra dose of motivation that’ll truly help you stay the course, shed weight and make some extra money in the process. There’s no better time than right now to bank on yourself.
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