Category

Corporate Wellness

Outcome-Based Wellness Program: Self-Care Zone in Workplace

By Corporate Wellness, Health, Press

In Malaysia, the rising health-related issues and problems faced by the corporate workforce currently is the ever-increasing medical cost, the increase number of critical illnesses reported, and the continuation of an exceptionally unhealthy lifestyle of business professionals.

These core issues, mainly because most people do not practice healthy lifestyle and conduct regular medical checkups to understand their health condition.

Thus, lack of health awareness has became a major challenge for the corporate workforce as they struggled to lead a good corporate wellness program, and improve employees’ health consistently over time.

 

 

Outcome-based Wellness Program

Most employers start a wellness program to improve employee health, improve employee productivity, or reduce their health care costs.  The goal of every wellness program should be to help employees adopt and maintain healthy behaviors. If wellness programs are successful, they will improve employee health and reduce healthcare costs. Since every company with a wellness program is trying to produce one of these outcomes, so here comes to the next question for Human Resource Department…

“Is your corporate wellness program successful? How does HR justify if the outcome is successful despite of using the participation rate?”

These aren’t just the challenges that most of the companies are facing, by just implementing a wellness program for the sake of organizing.  The purpose of any wellness program should be to improve the health of employees, sustainably. That means the program should be focused on behavioral change in lifestyle, and we all know, it takes long time make this as a company’s culture.

Some corporates use incentives to motivate employees to improve their health. Any kind of incentives-based program that are being used in the nation is only to create a short-term gimmick but it might not be able to make a sustainable healthy workplace.

Hence, this is the reason why many of the HR nowadays looking for a better solution which it can be successfully integrated into an incentive strategy and still able to increase health awareness through a routine health evaluation tool.

InBody Self-Care Zone in collaboration with PMCare

PMCare and InBody sought to address these issue by finding a creative way to administer and empower the concept of self-care among the corporate workforce. InBody Self-Care Zone is a product of an intellectual collaboration between PMCare and InBody as the primary solution to promote self-care with outcome-based program that shows evidence of employees’ health by improving body composition as the basic of overall health assessment. With this initiative, PMCare and InBody sought to support Malaysia’s transformation in cultivating a healthier lifestyle and becoming a renowned Vibrant Living Nation.

The Self-Care Zone is a special area equipped with InBody proprietary state-of-the-art health devices that enables employees to track their health parameters such as heart rate, muscle mass, fat percentage, segmental lean & fat analysis, and more in the body compositions. The devices are also integrated with the InBody Mobile App that streamlines the measurement records on the devices with an internal data system, which can be used by employees to monitor their health parameters and track any improvements from time to time. Besides, the human resource department can also use the LookinBody Web to manage data of employees’ measurement analysis in order to have a complete picture of overall health status changes in the organization.

On top of that, the Self-Care Zone is a great catalyst for the corporate workforce to encourage and empower their employees to adopt a healthier, active lifestyle – act as an self-motivational tracker. Serving as the main health empowerment area of any corporate office, it provides the right atmosphere and environment for employees to take a more active control in the management of their personal health. Setting up this InBody Self-Care zone at PMCare office enables their employees to also track their progress regularly, helping them to continue a sustainable overall health journey.

PMCare and InBody had also run this self-care zone program for the employees in Mitsubishi Motors Malaysia  . Watch the review from  Ms Christina – Head Of Human Resource shared about her point of view in HR about their experience in this program.

For more corporate solutions, please feel free to contact our Corporate Wellness Specialists or email us at info@inbody.com

 

 

5 Ways Sitting All Day Wrecks Your Body Composition

By Corporate Wellness

Think about how long you sit in a day. It’s probably something you have never tracked, but on average Americans spend more than half their waking hours sitting! Between sitting in traffic, attending class or work, or relaxing on the sofa the number of hours you spend sitting can add up quickly. Even if you exercise three times a week, you may still suffer from a sedentary lifestyle because its hard to counteract the total number of hours that you sit in a week. Why does this matter? How much harm can sitting most of the day actually do to your health? Quite a lot actually. According to recent studies, your inactive, sedentary lifestyle may be shortening your lifespan!

You May Want to Stand Up for This

Headlines like “Sitting is the new smoking” might seem like the type of clickbait health article you can dismiss because everyone else is sitting all day too so … how can it harm you right?

Not so fast. In 2009, over 17,000 Canadians participated in a study that sought to find a connection between sitting and mortality. Participants ranged in age, body type, and activity level. At the end of the study, researchers found an association between sitting time and mortality from all causes and concluded extended periods of sitting should be discouraged. A sedentary lifestyle where you sit all day harms your health by encouraging muscle loss and fat gain and increasing your risk factor for multiple diseases.  

In this article, we will cover the five ways your body composition is negatively affected by too much sitting. But don’t worry, it’s not all doom-and-gloom: we have tips on how you can break up long periods of sitting, even if you work a desk job.

#1: Insulin Resistance

Diabetes is one of the leading causes of death among Americans. Those who sit for extended periods of time, don’t exercise, and don’t take care of their nutrition can experience insulin resistance, which happens when insulin isn’t able to transport excess blood sugar out of your blood and into your muscles. When insulin resistance because significant, that’s type-2 diabetes.

One study of 3,757 women found that women who sat for eight hours a day had a 56 percent higher chance of developing diabetes. Diabetics tend to have more fat within their bodies, particularly visceral fat, which can further encourage insulin resistance and keep them from being healthy.

In addition, diabetics experience quicker loss of muscle mass as they age compared to healthy individuals. The loss of muscle intensifies symptoms further deteriorates body composition.

#2: Risk for Heart Disease

Enzymes that burn body fat decrease by 90% when sitting for an hour or longer. The enzyme involved with body fat burning is called lipoprotein lipase, or LPL. LPL’s role is to produce good cholesterol, or HDL, which helps with triglyceride levels and protects against heart disease by keeping bad cholesterol from building up in the arteries. A sedentary lifestyle has been shown to decrease HDL Levels.  A low HDL level is a common metabolic syndrome risk factor and is associated with increased risk of hypertension (high blood pressures) and cardiovascular disease.

In a 2003 animal study, rodents were forced to stay lying down for most of the day – to simulate a sedentary lifestyle – and the researchers found that the LPL levels in their leg muscles decreased immensely. When they stood up, the enzyme was ten times more active! Although these studies with humans are still underway, its still a convincing reason to take short breaks with moderate physical activity.

#3: Muscles become weaker

When you sit, your gluteal muscles, abdominal muscles, and legs lay dormant. If you sit for extended periods of time day after day, these muscles can degenerate. Because the size of your metabolism is linked with your body composition – more muscle increases metabolism and helps your burn more calories – any muscle loss, especially from the lower body which is your largest muscle group, can lead to consistent fat gain if the diet is not changed.

In the future, gradual muscle loss from your lower body can hurt your functional strength and as you become older increase your fall risk and affect your ability to live independently.    

#4: Circulation Becomes Slower

Not only does blood flow to your brain slow down when you sit for too long, but the blood flow to your legs also becomes sluggish. Sitting for an excessive period of time without standing can increase the risk of developing blood clots. Most of the time blood clots are harmless and will dissolve on its own. But there is the possibility that the blood clot breaks off and cause blockage in the lungs, which can be fatal.  

One study showed a profound reduction in the vascular flow after sitting for just three hours. But the researchers found that those who took breaks and got up to walk around for two minutes, every hour, increased their lifespan by 33 percent.

#5: Bones Become Brittle

Long-term sitting and inactivity can lead to weakened bones. The Mayo Clinic has stated that “People who spend a lot of time sitting have a higher risk of osteoporosis than do those who are more active.” The reason is that bone is live tissue that is constantly in a state of forming new bone material and absorbing the old bone material. As we age the rate that bone is reabsorbed is faster than new bone that is formed. One of the factors that lead to rapid bone loss is a lack of physical activity.

Like muscles, bones become stronger when they are used. Engaging in walking and movement which includes weight-bearing can increase the durability of bones.

Tips to Get Moving!

 

How can you increase your physical activity, even if you work all day? You have to get creative. Here are some tips to help you get started.

  1. Transportation – Do you drive to work? If so, park as far away as possible to get in extra steps throughout the day. If you can, bike or walk to the office. Take the steps up to your office if you are not on the first floor. If you can work from home, work from your home office. When at home, get up, do some walking, and even walk to the library to do more work. Think about your day before it starts to get those extra steps in each and every day.
  2. Layout makeover –  Have you taken a look at your office? Sometimes moving your office objects may make it easier for you to get your steps in. Take a look, is your printer close to your computer? Try to move it across the room to make yourself get up and move. Most of us live with our cell phones very close to us. Move your cell phone’s charger by the printer; it will help you get up to move and keep you less distracted. Make coffee in your break room, come back and do some work, and get up again to get your coffee. Anything to get yourself moving counts towards your health.
  3. Change up the way you sit –  If you are allowed, sit on an exercise ball at your desk for short periods, or take it a step further and try a standing desk. There are unique ways of moving at work nowadays with standing desks, treadmill desks, and even bicycle desks. Imagine getting through one of your long meetings with an hour-long bike ride, instead of a large latte. If none of these are viable options, or if an exercise ball isn’t your thing, there are exercises you can do in your desk chair that engage the muscles of your core.
  4. Trade out your comfy chair – If you are not allowed to use a ball or cool new desk, try just an old fashioned wooden, uncomfortable chair. It will make you sit up straight if you must remain sitting, attempt good posture.
  5. Alarm clock – Set a timer every hour for two minutes of constant movement. Try to keep moving with different exercises, sometimes called deskercises, stretches, or take a lap or two around the building.
  6. Step Tracker – Motivate yourself by purchasing a step tracker. It is an eye opener to many individuals to see how much you are sitting around. Many trackers you can wear as a bracelet and challenge friends to different goals.

Now It’s Your Turn: Be a Role Model

If you work an office job or you have a full course load, it can be easy to become inactive and lead a sedentary lifestyle. The good news is that recent studies found that just one hour of physical activity can potentially offset the 8-hour sitting marathon many people perform in their offices. That doesn’t mean that getting all your activity for the day in your one-hour gym session is enough because you can’t forget the time you spend driving and relaxing at home! The idea is to find opportunities to get moving.

Now that you’re at the end of the article, stand up and start moving! Your body will thank you for it.

***

Janine Kelbach, RNC-OB is a Registered Nurse certified in Obstetrics. She has been practicing in labor and delivery for over a decade. She developed her writing career in 2012, specializing in health topics. She, her husband, Adam, and two children Zachary and James reside in Cleveland, OH

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