Health promotion stresses early
detection of health risks, utilization of resources for
appropriate and timely care, and monitoring of health
care costs. As one part of a total health plan strategy,
employee assistance programs range from the provision of
information to efforts to encourage health-related
behavior change.
Medical screening can be an
effective technique to detect disease in the earliest
stages; however, its use in insurance underwriting is
controversial.
Health promotion and disease
prevention's place on the public policy agenda was
defined for the coming decade with the publication of a
national strategy for improving the nation's health,
emphasizing health promotion, health protection, and
disease prevention.
The U.S. Surgeon General describes
smoking as the largest single preventable cause of death
and disability for the U.S. population. Annual costs to
the health care system of smoking-related illnesses
exceed $65 billion and are increasing at the rate of 22
percent to 25 percent per year.
The Office of Technology Assessment
estimates that early and frequent prenatal care can save
the U.S. health care system between $14,000 and $30,000
in newborn, first year, and long-term health care costs.
The lifetime custodial cost of caring for a low
birth-weight baby can reach $500,000.
A recent study showed that persons
who did not exercise had 114 percent higher nonmaternity
medical claims costs, used 30 percent more hospital days,
and were 41 percent more likely to have annual claims of
more than $5,000 than those who exercised the equivalent
of climbing 15 flights of stairs or walking 1.5 miles
four or more times a week.
