Wellness is a philosophy

Wellness is a way of living healthy, a way of living period.

Personal wellness

Personal wellness is defined as a dynamic process of becoming aware of and making conscious choices toward a more balanced healthy lifestyle. It includes learning new coping and communication skills that address both the positive and negative aspects of human existence.

Wellness as wholeness

Wellness as wholeness is a way of cultivating health and well-being of individuals, communities, organizations, societies, and the environment by living and acting with awareness of the wholeness and the interconnectedness of all living systems.

Wellness requires...

Wellness requires personal transformation vs transactions between individuals. Remembering that no one is perfect, and being well requires taking accountability/responsibility for your own experience.

What is Well-being?*

There is no consensus around a single definition of well-being, but there is general agreement that at minimum, well-being includes the presence of positive emotions and moods (e.g., contentment, happiness), the absence of negative emotions (e.g., depression, anxiety), satisfaction with life, fulfillment and positive functioning. In simple terms, well-being can be described as judging life positively and feeling good. For public health purposes, physical well-being (e.g., feeling very healthy and full of energy) is also viewed as critical to overall well-being. Researchers from different disciplines have examined different aspects of well-being that include the following:

· Physical well-being.
· Economic well-being.
· Social well-being.
· Development and activity.
· Emotional well-being.
· Psychological well-being.
· Life satisfaction.
· Domain specific satisfaction.
· Engaging activities and work.

What is the difference between health-related quality of life, well-being, flourishing, positive mental health, optimal health, happiness, subjective well-being, psychological well-being, life satisfaction, hedonic well-being, and other terms that exist in the literature?

Some researchers suggest that many of the terms are synonymous, whereas others note that there are major differences based on which dimensions are independent and contribute most to well-being. This is an evolving science, with contributions from multiple disciplines. Traditionally, health-related quality of life has been linked to patient outcomes, and has generally focused on deficits in functioning (e.g., pain, negative affect). In contrast, well-being focuses on assets in functioning, including positive emotions and psychological resources (e.g., positive affect, autonomy, mastery) as key components. Some researchers have drawn from both perspectives to measure physical and mental well-being for clinical and economic studies. Subjective well-being typically refers to self-reports contrasted with objective indicators of well-being. The term, "positive mental health" calls attention to the psychological components that comprise well-being from the perspective of individuals interested primarily in the mental health domain. From this perspective, positive mental health is a resource, broadly inclusive of psychological assets and skills essential for well-being. But, the latter generally excludes the physical component of well-being. "Hedonic" well-being focuses on the "feeling" component of well-being (e.g., happiness) in contrast to “eudaimonic” well-being which focuses on the "thinking" component of well-being (e.g., fulfillment). People with high levels of positive emotions, and those who are functioning well psychologically and socially are described by some as having complete mental health, or as "flourishing".

In summary, positive mental health, well-being and flourishing refer to the presence of high levels of positive functioning—primarily in the mental health domain (inclusive of social health). However, in its broadest sense, well-being encompasses physical, mental and social domains.

The reasons why well-being and related constructs should be measured and evaluating how these domains can be changed should help inform which domains, e.g., life satisfaction, positive affect, autonomy, meaning, vitality, pain) should be measured, and which instruments and methods to use.

* Much of this material is taken from pages at the Center for Disease Control and Prevention

What does this mean?

How can I achieve this?

Relevance for Wellness Professionals

What is Workplace or Corporate Wellness?

Workplace Wellness is defined as:

An organized employer-sponsored program that is designed to support employees (and sometime, their families) as they adopt and sustain behaviors that reduce health risks, improve quality of life, enhance personal effectiveness, and benefit the organization's bottom line.” as defined by Leonard L. Berry, Ann M. Mirabito, and William B. Baum in What's the Hard Return on Employee Wellness Programs? Harvard Business Review. Dec. 2010 pp 1-9.

What is Health Promotion?

• The World Health Organization (WHO) defines health promotion as the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health. It moves beyond a focus on individual behavior towards a wide range of social and environmental interventions.


• When providing wellness programming, health promotion defines the basic marketing and promotion of risk reduction health programs. These health programs are grounded in the disciplines of social marketing, health communication, business marketing and use of incentives that address consumer health "needs" and customer "wants."

Health promotion/wellness programs Defined

• Comprehensive wellness strategies are based on population health research. Determinates of individual health are attributed to four main factors.
  • 30% of individual's health is based on health behaviors
  • 40% of individual's health is based on social and economic conditions
  • 40% of individual's health is based on physical environments
  • 10% of individual's health is based on good clinical care


• Example of health promotion programs include but are not limited to:
  • Disease management programs
  • Increased productivity
  • Risk reduction
  • Nutrition and exercise
  • Stress management
  • Health coaching
  • Marketing
  • Communications
  • Incentives


• Wellness however is based upon a holistic approach that requires individual transformation delivered through focusing on the 7 dimensions of wellness: Spiritual, Physical, Intellectual, Emotional, Career, Environmental, and Social.

What is the Health Care Continuum Concept?

• Introduction to the Health Care Continuum Concept was started In 1970,.by John W. Travis, M.D., MPH. He envisioned the idea for the Illness-Wellness Continuum that placed "wellness" in a revolutionary new context and bridged health and human potential. This early health continuum model bridged the relationship between wellness, medically driven treatment models and high-level wellness

1. Individuals moving from the center or neutral point to the left or treatment model moved to deteriorating states of health and finally premature death.
2. Individuals moving to the right of center increased their levels of health and well-being through awareness, education and wellness growth.
3. One of the core concepts of the continuum was that the Treatment Paradigm could only take individuals back to the neutral point, where the symptoms of disease have been alleviated. The Wellness Paradigm, which could be utilized at any point on the continuum, moved individuals toward higher levels of wellness.

• In 2012, Eddington introduced a new Health Care Continuum Concept in which he emphasized "Instead of aiming for a return to the status quo, a focus on positive health would move us beyond the status quo toward outcomes that exceed expectations. While risk reduction and health maintenance are noble, it is time to move the focus and efforts toward positive health potential through improved physical, mental, and social capabilities."

Who is the Benefit professional?

In larger organizations, the benefit professional works more closely with decision makers to keep the business afloat. They may be or work closely with the Corporate Financial Officer (CFO). They make benefits design based upon real time data analysis, e.g. data mining, in terms of benefit design to save money. In smaller businesses, the benefit design me be done by human resources or outsourced to a broker. See https://www.ifebp.org/

Benefit vs. Human Resource Professionals.

Benefits are different in that they use an actuary approach in using numbers to evaluate the likelihood of future events, and designing creative ways to reduce or manage undesirable events. Benefits role is to “keep the business afloat”. Human resources usually implements benefit plans, hires and motivates employees to perform at their best by exchanging rewards for performance. See http://www.shrm.org/

What is Productivity ROI?

Productivity measurement may provide a better link than disease management to corporate America's bottom line. Example: The Integrated Benefits Institute (IBI) is a pioneer, leader and nonprofit supplier of health and productivity research, measurement and benchmarking. See http://www.ibiweb.org/

What is Value-based Health Care?

VBHC strives to remove barriers and align both financial and non-financial incentives and rewards for living healthy and productive lives by using prevention, (population health) health enhancement strategies (internal policy, rewards & management support) and health care services (prevention and managed care).

Value-based Insurance Design

V-BID is an innovative approach that can improve clinical outcomes and contain costs. The basic premise of V-BID is to align consumer incentives with value by reducing barriers to high-value health services and providers ("carrots" or intrinsic motivation) and discouraging the use of low-value health services and providers ("sticks" or extrinsic motivation). When "carrots" are coupled with "sticks" in a clinically nuanced manner, V-BID improves health care quality and controls spending growth.

The concept of clinical nuance recognizes that:

1. Medical services differ in the benefit provided; and
2. The clinical benefit derived from a specific service depends on the patient using it, as well as when and where the service is provided. See

http://vbidcenter.org/

What is a Wellness Benefit Manager?

This new role combines skill sets of the benefit specialist and the wellness professional with the purpose integration of wellness into benefit design and of enhancing communication. See Abbott Solutions

Your Certificate

Become Your Own Wellness Coach

Track Your Progress

These assessment plans can help you track your wellness progress

 Assessments for the individual

Standard Individual Account

Includes:

1. Individual Report
2. General Guidelines for Making Healthy Changes
3. Individual vs Group Comparison Report
4. Individual Percentile Report
5. Selected Consumer Resources
6. Level I BYOWC Certificate

Pricing and Ordering

Advanced Individual Account

Includes:

1. Individual can take up to 5 assessments over time
2. Individual Report
3. General Guidelines for Making Healthy Changes
4. Individual/Group Comparison Report
5. Individual Percentile Report
6. Time Tracking Report comparing up to 5 results taken over time
7. Selected Consumer Resources
8. Level II BYOWC Certificate

Pricing and Ordering

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Group Accounts for Employers, Teachers, Wellness Professionals, Trainers, Health Coaches. Wellness professionals, trainers and health coaches will find that 7dimensionsofwellness.com offers complementary options to assist clients in taking the next steps for well being and that of transformation and insights into connection, consciousness and universal human values, a place in which one finds consistency in "head, heart and hands".

Professional Group Free Trial Account

Includes:

1. Ability to create and administer assessments to your own groups
2. Group Aggregate Reports
3. Group Comparison Reports
4. Demographic Breakdown Reports
5. 35 Free assessment

Try

Standard Professional Group Account

Includes:

1. Ability to create assessment groups and administer assessments to your own groups
2. Group Aggregate Reports
3. Group Comparison Reports
4. Demographic Breakdown Reports
5. Advanced Ad Hoc Reporting

Pricing and Ordering

Advanced Professional Group Account

Includes:

1. Ability to create and administer assessments to your own groups
2. Ability to create time tracking groups
3. Group Aggregate Reports
4. Group Comparison Reports
5. Demographic Breakdown Reports
6. Time Tracking Reports available for individuals
7. Advanced Ad Hoc Reporting

Pricing and Ordering

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Consulting Services

Benefits Wellness Management Website Wellness Consulting

Resources to grow by