The idea that a workplace nutrition program could decrease absenteeism can be a hard sell to employers. After all, it's laughable to imagine CEOs huddled around a boardroom table discussing something as trivial as employee intake of fruits and vegetables. Employers might be disregarding the impact of nutrition on worker absenteeism a bit too quickly, however. While it's difficult to prove a subtle trend -- such as subpar performance in an employee on a temporary fast food binge -- it's not such a stretch to consider that a chronically malnourished employee may call in sick more frequently than his healthy counterparts.
Background
Personal illness, family issues and personal needs -- including stress related issues -- are estimated to account for 57 percent of employee absences, according to a 2003 report from the Personal Finance Foundation. This amounts to $100 billion in lost productivity and health expenses.
Evidence
While it's obvious that a sick employee is likely to be absent, it's more difficult to separate out the multitude of causes that contribute to illness and disease. According to the American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, employee illness and stress can often be attributed to poor health resulting from unhealthy lifestyle choices. This means an employee who fails to exercise or regularly consumes a nutrient-poor diet may indirectly increase absenteeism.
Diet Related Illness
America's obesity epidemic has potential to surpass other sources of employee absenteeism, especially when obesity-related diseases like diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease are added to the equation. Obese employees are estimated to be twice as likely to have high absenteeism -- defined as seven or more illnesses in a six-month period -- in comparison with healthy-weight colleagues. Obese employees with no history of chronic disease are likely to also suffer from sub-clinical problems that might increase absenteeism, including joint pain, sleep apnea, alterations in blood sugar metabolism and depression.
Workplace Wellness
Not all employers are comfortable about investing in an employee wellness program. After all, pulling workers off an assembly line for a lesson in low salt cooking seems counterintuitive. Wellness programs are effective, however. Well-managed programs improve dietary health knowledge, attitudes and behavior. However, the bottom-line cost savings for employers is less certain. In 2008, the World Health Organization cited an optimistic estimate that worksite wellness programs could potentially reduce absenteeism and medical costs by 25 to 35 percent over a four-year period. However, until better cost effectiveness research is completed, wellness programs may remain a hard sell for many employers.
References
- Financial Stress and Absenteeism: An Empirically Derived Research Model; Kim and Garman; 2003
- American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine; Health Promotion Programs, Workplace Modifiable Health Risks and Employee Absenteeism; Aldana and Pronk; 2001
- American Journal of Health Promotion: Obesity and Absenteeism: An Epidemiologic Study of 10,825 Employed Adults
- World Health Organization: Effectiveness and Economic Impact
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