PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT:

I am a Registered Professional Nurse with multi-state licensing.  I am also certified as a Hormone Practitioner and have a small private practice working with individual clients.  I have achieved Welcoa faculty status.  I work in both holistic practice with my consulting and hormone practice and stay abreast of all of the most recent research and trends through multiple affiliations.  I am presently working toward becoming a nationally certified gut health practitioner and have done several years of education as a precursor to this certification.  I work closely with a physical therapy practice that offers fascial manipulations as well as alternate therapies in alkalinity and infrared and crystal heat therapies.  I am in the medical health an wellness field because I came from a family of doctors and nurses.  My father was from India and so I am versed in the Ayurvedic approaches as well as the western traditions.  I love to combine the two with clients.   My RN has definitely been the most valuable because the scope of knowledge is far reaching.  It offers an opportunity to move into several different realms with a solid foundation of medical science and logical thinking.  It also encourages the connection that humans so greatly need!  
The major health contributions I have made are by far the introduction to my clients to alternative and functional medicine approaches to health and lifestyle.  Because I have worked with as many as 300 companies at a time, I have been able to introduce homeopathy, EFT, green drinks, natural healing and organic eating etc… to hundreds of people at a time.  I have offered resources that mainstream medicine and media do not.  Always with the mindset for people that my information is simply a resource. What you choose to do with it,  belongs to you and how it best fits with where you are at this moment in your life.

i would say that there were several groups that were very successful, but I will address RiverWoods of Exeter. This is a retirement community with shift work employees, various fields from admin and sr. staff to nursing and food service to grounds and temporary student employees. We took an already positive wellness environment and turned it into a comprehensive culture of wellness where the company didn’t simply implement a wellness program or plan, but became a wellness culture that enhanced peoples lives and met them each where they were… and just happened to be where they worked too. The CEO, Sr. HR and all department heads and staff fully engaged.  Each person at the place that they were.  We offered something for everyone. We offered nutrition counseling and meal prep on night shifts, biometrics on alternate days and weeks to make it easy for everyone, we brought in a menopause series for the largely female population.  While we were cognizant of their risks, we used lifestyle programs that would address multiple concerns without singling out specific medical issues. Over the course of 4 years, we went from very specific stick type programming to complete carrot programming where employees were trusted to be responsible for their completion of incentives and programs.  Our engagement after the first two years for programs including biometrics was 98%  year 3 and 100% year 4 and we moved the claims MLR from 120%-82% (meaning the claims costs and risks decreased significantly!).  The

company brought in CSA’s from local farms to encourage community involvement and offered actual cash handed to you at the end of a 5K community race that the entire company supported and participated in.  The onsite fitness professionals offered private personal training that the company paid for and additionally, offered help obtaining the gear you needed to participate in a chosen activity to meet your lifestyle goals by partnering with outside local vendors such as shoe stores or yoga studios. It became an extraordinary culture.  Employees were and are healthier and presenteeism is virtually non existent. People talk to each other across all departments and professions there.  I have heard employees thank the HR professional for the supportive work environment they have! The intervention that I believe had the greatest impact was when we started using themes for the year’s programming. And the year that Happiness was the theme, we saw amazing transformations.  All the programming I built had to do with what brought employees joy or created happiness or encouraged the pay it forward mindset.  Employees appreciated that RiverWoods cared about them and showed it. 

I used all of the 7 benchmarks for this group.  The CEO, HR and department heads were all committed to the wellness culture and provided example by participating, allowing time away from jobs, bringing in healthy foods at meetings, incenting their benefits, and providing ample funding.  Early on we did employee surveys and held a meeting to introduce  what we were planning over the next few years.  We implemented a wellness committee that changed members regularly and offered gratitude to those who participated on the committee. We evaluated all programming and thus knew we could move from the stick to the carrots..and that over time we offered less requirements to meet incentives. The company continues to evolve their wellness and evaluate the effectiveness along with the morale of the employees. 

LEADERSHIP: I believe I have served as a leader or role model in the health promotion industry in the following ways;

I exercise at least 5 days a week with my chosen types as yoga, pilates, running and weight training.  I have had a green drink every day for the last 15 years and have shared my recipes and philosophy around it with numerous individuals and companies by doing presentations with samples.  I have many hundreds of converts!  :) My family and I eat healthy organically grown foods  roughly 85% of the time and volunteer in our community.  I am constantly encouraging people to make one small change and not become overwhelmed by the larger picture of what they believe is good health.  We are all different and in different places emotionally, physically, mentally on any given day and so I teach my clients that we need to be gentle with each other and with ourselves. Today may be horrible but next week may have a day of absolute perfection for 15 minutes. We need to celebrate that 15 minutes, focus on it and move forward.. Over time our mindset will encourage many more of those perfect moments in time and we will evolve all the way around. Great lifestyles are not numbers or data…people are not static numbers or data, but we can make changes for the better if we remove our focus from that.  I lead by teaching how to be engaged in their own lives.  
I believe my upbringing  allowed me to achieve a status as a leader.  My great grandmother was the town midwife and herbalist…living close to the earth and more in line with our bodies and nature and as people and not data is how I grew up. I learned to respect the innate abilities of our bodies if we work with them. My education also offered the credentialing to be trusted to impart truth in whatever realm I was talking.  Ayurvedic or traditional western or even spiritual. 
I would tell other wellness practitioners to find where they live.  Fully understand your own philosophy about what well means to you and grow from there.  Study and read as much as you can to support your way of offering wellness in a responsible way. 

INNOVATION:

I have done the following 5 things that were perhaps innovative for promoting the health industry and encouraged population health management.

I never judge anyone…I have no idea what your story is and so can not stand in judgement of your ice cream or your medication to control a biometric number.  I have found that this has more times than not, made people comfortable and at ease with me.  I am approachable and may offer information to help change something, but I never say anything to judge employees or groups.  I have found many, many wellness folks who do that even if unintentionally.
I never separate myself out as the expert.  I am just like the clients I work with…good days and bad days… Sleep well and not so well… tired and cranky or happy and full of energy.  This is something I find creates relationships that actually can make positive changes for one person at a time or large groups together.  and for me…sharing our shortcomings together and celebrating our successes.  It also seems to engage more people sooner and therefore effects population health.
I listen…not maybe unusual, but I have been in many realms when practitioners have prepared responses or agendas that need to be adhered to. While i appreciate the need to work toward a goal… I am fine to stop, get off topic and listen to where people really are.  I try not to have ready responses and often get back to folks on things so that I can mull over conversations.  When people feel they are truly heard, they are more apt to engage.
I offer “out of the box” information and resources that are totally client specific whether I have 50 groups I’m working with or 2.  No one gets the same thing, nothing canned.  I also evolve information over time as the population gets more informed.. that keeps them engaged and interested.
I stay abreast of the latest research and never rest on an accepted idea or thought about wellness or health.  Because my clients know this, they remain actively engaged.  I share as much as I can.  While there are programs like 10k step walking programs, nutrition label reading, food pyramid ideas, new vaccine info etc… I keep my folks in the loop on how things are changing.  I think these things are not necessarily new, but in our tech world and quick hit culture…I think they sometimes actually are more innovative in managing population health and increase engagement in wellness programming. Employees in our groups were part of creating the plans for what we brought in and knew they had the latest information to work with. :)

As I mentioned earlier, by implementing these strategies, I have effected multiple MLR’s for the better in many groups.  I have increased participation numbers and received wellness money directly from the carriers because they have seen worthwhile changes in the group claims.  One group received $15,000.00.  Another received $10,000.00 from their carrier.  These were provided because biometric numbers improved, large claims were reduced and overall the companies moved as wholes to better health.

COMPELLING VISION:

I  think the biggest threats to the industry are actually these two things.  First, it seems that many wellness practitioners are women and that generally keeps salaries lower. Unfortunate in trying to build the diversity that employees health requires.  Second, there is no standard of credible licensing or valid certification required to promote workforce wellness.  Some are Nurses in the field, some are personal trainers, others those who simply did webinars or weekend certifications on the topic.  When you are affecting important things like lifestyle and health issues, you need qualified practitioners with solid backgrounds to draw from.  I think that is going to be important in making this a valid profession.  i am happy that many colleges are offering or developing wellness degree programs.

In the next 5 years I will be continuing my education and have just recently started my own consulting company.  My hope is to continue to offer innovative and alternative ideas for health and lifestyle issues to more companies on a national level.  I have a national network of practitioners that are affiliating with me and also some affiliate product companies that will enhance and complement the vision of my company.  My hope is to encourage people to incorporate lifestyle habits that move them to more independence in their health and away from the need for medical intervention.