The City-County Health Department in Great Falls mentors a variety of worksites in Great Falls in worksite wellness and cancer prevention programs. Currently, the Great Falls Police Department, Public Works and Civic Center are participating in the program. The organization believes that health promotion in the workplace is an investment in their most important asset, their employees. They have worked hard to create a wellness program that their employees value and are eager to participate in year after year.
To guide their program design and development the City of Great Falls Wellness Program utilized WELCOA’s Seven Benchmarks for Successful Wellness Programs: Capturing Leadership Support, Creating Cohesive Wellness Teams, Collecting Data to Drive Health Efforts, Crafting an Operating Plan, Choosing Appropriate Interventions, Creating a Supportive Environment and Consistently Evaluating Outcomes. Each of the worksites has access to wonderful incentive campaigns and wellness webinars sponsored by WELCOA.
Over the past four years, the City of Great Falls Worksite Wellness Program has been very successful. Listed below are just a few their proudest accomplishments.
•Establishing cohesive wellness teams at each worksite
•Offering biometric screenings with insurance incentives
•Promoting walking breaks/buddy walking during work day hours
•Distributing walking maps developed by wellness team members to each worksite
•Cancer prevention awareness days
•Hosting “Lunch and Learns” and “Grab and Goes”
•Stocking all vending machines with healthy choices
•Promoting physical activity for those in jobs where exercise may be challenging
•Hosting Wellness Walks
•Including stretch breaks as part of meeting agendas
The City of Great Falls Wellness Program worksites will be highlighted in the upcoming CDC Action Guide for Breast Cancer and Cervical Cancer Screening for employees for their outstanding work in promoting cancer screening in the work place. Additionally, the Colon Cancer Alliance recognized two of the City of Great Falls Wellness Program sites for their promotion of Colon Cancer awareness in 2013.
The City of Great Falls hosts an annual health fair and this year’s fair will be sometime in September 2014.
For more information about the City of Great Falls Wellness Program, please contact Penny Paul at ppaul@cascadecountymt.gov.