Is intervention better than cure?
Brandwood Clinic
A Daily Express front page story screamed the latest grim news on health - click here.
The massive growth in people struggling with diabetes is also leading to a surge in new diagnoses of cancer.
Newspapers love scare stories of course but the rise in diabetes cases is of genuine concern to the health service, as people continue to ignore advice on diet and wellbeing.
A 65% increase over a decade is a statistic that should worry everyone.
To what extent employers should be involved in employee and general health issues is a reasonable issue for debate.
The cost to productivity caused by increased absences is well known.
Potentially losing valuable employees for prolonged periods or random intervals is equally damaging.
We pay a lot of attention to employee retention, should we be doing the same for employee health?
With underfunded public health services increasingly unable to cope it may be a role that employers are forced to adopt.
In the past, our idea of taking responsibility was to add private medical insurance as an employee benefit, a sticking plaster for corporate responsibility perhaps.
Since this is generally only called upon at the point of illness the intervention may have to start earlier.
Naturally, the balance of caring and preaching is difficult. Whilst the ‘five a day’ message on fruit and vegetables is well known it is still not widely adopted, recognition is not the same as adoption.
At the same time, we accept that prevention is better than cure and to fail to attempt to encourage employee wellbeing would be a dereliction of duty.
At Brandwood, alongside our world-renowned scalp micropigmentation service, we have introduced a personalised diet & lifestyle program that provides a tailored approach to health & wellbeing for individuals.
It is part of a long-term plan to tackle diabetes and prevent other health issues occurring. In our tests earlier this year it proved incredibly effective and enabled participants to Improve many health symptoms, reduce medications and, in certain cases, return blood sugar levels to back to within normal healthy parameters.
The “Back in Balance” program (www.brandwoodclinic.com/news/defeat-diabetes-now/) is easy for people to follow, we advise and mentor them through the dietary changes, helping them to address stress management and work towards a proactive way of self-health.
A low cost, one-to-one approach may be the best fit to drive results.
This said, it may not be a one-size fits all solution. In 2018 we will look at taking seminars and programmes into the workplace where peer pressure, group participation and encouragement could have a significant impact.
We’re interested in talking to HR and occupational health departments throughout the region to see where we can help.
These issues look unlikely to be resolved easily, when general advice is ignored it may be time to get personal.