Increasingly, more employers are offering workplace wellness programs to promote and encourage healthier lifestyles for their employees and to prevent disease.
These programs often involve medical questionnaires, health risk assessments and biometric screenings to determine employees’ health risk factors such as weight, cholesterol, glucose and blood pressure. Some employers and health insurance plans offer incentives, financial and otherwise to employees who participate in wellness programs or achieve certain health outcomes. Using incentives to boost participation in wellness programs came under fire when the general counsel for the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission filed several lawsuits against employers alleging that their wellness programs violated federal law.
