Six in 10 Americans live with at least one chronic disease, such as heart disease, cancer, stroke or diabetes. In any given workplace, those chronic diseases drive health care costs.
Preventing chronic disease, or managing symptoms if prevention is not possible, will help a company’s population pay less for medical care in the long run. You can be known as a wellness champion when you provide a solution for your employees to address chronic diseases. Before we dive into solutions, what are the most prevalent chronic diseases?
The Chronic Diseases
Diabetes
Medical expenditures of people with diabetes are approximately 2.3 times higher than expected costs if they did not have diabetes. Effective interventions that prevent or delay type 2 diabetes and diabetic complications might result in substantial long-term savings in healthcare costs.*
Obesity
Achieving 150 active minutes a week and 5%-7% weight loss reduces risk of developing type 2 diabetes by 58% (71% if you’re over age 60.)*
Cancer
Each year in the United States, more than 1.7 million people are diagnosed with cancer, and almost 600,000 die from it, making it the second leading cause of death. The cost of cancer care continues to rise and is expected to reach almost $174 billion by 2020.*
The stats above pose a significant cost-saving opportunity if companies can address these chronic diseases in the workplace.
With Fitspot’s premium partners, they address and improve not just employee’s health, but the health of their families, with apps that are accessible at work and at home. These partners all have similarities: they engage users on a daily basis through technology. Below, we’ll run through the solutions that Fitspot’s partners offer to help manage and prevent chronic disease.
The Solutions
Sweetch
What if you could provide employees with an artificial intelligence-based app that’s clinically proven to increase physical activity, lose weight, and reduce diabetes risk?
Sweetch starts with machine learning predictions to calculate an individual’s diabetes risk. Then its AI system engages with users to offer personalized recommendations based on real-world behavior that can fit with a user’s life. Personalized prevention focuses on weight loss, diet and nutrition, and physical fitness, all contributing factors to diabetes, obesity, and cancer. Sweetch’s algorithm changes with the user over time, so as employees progress, so do their messages (that provide encouraging tips) from the app. A scale at home tracks the entire family’s journey.
Zipongo
A 2019 study found that one in four people got food at work and it was usually high in empty calories, salt, fat, and sugar. This certainly isn’t helping with the obesity epidemic, as research has proven that what you eat is three times more important than physical activity. So start by bringing healthy food to the workplace. Zipongo engages users daily to change eating behavior and improve health. The app personalizes nutrition tips and forms healthy eating habits based on each member. From recipes and meal planning to grocery lists and online ordering through meal kits or groceries, users can change their food environment at home and at work. That means employees have a chance to proactively choose more nutritious foods, which in turn could prevent 30-50 percent of all cancers.
*All date from CDC. https://www.cdc.gov/chronicdisease/about/costs/index.htm
Alexa is the Marketing Manager at Fitspot. She’s a storyteller and wordsmith who writes anything from blog posts to e-books to infographics. She’s passionate about running and fitness, and loves to share the Fitspot message of workplace wellness everywhere!
