Taking Your Health Risk Assessment Seriously

These days many businesses are offering the opportunity for their employees to complete a Health Risk Assessment in order to save them some money off their health insurance.  Some employees worry about how this factors into their employment and if their company is up to something by providing them this discount.  In reality, there is very little risk involved because your company is not looking for things to use against you however they are looking for ways to keep medical insurance costs down. 

A Health Risk Assessment is an evaluation of your health situation.  Some businesses only have workers fill out a written survey and use this to assess their health while other companies use a number of small tests including height, weight, and a blood draw to determine the health of the employee.

The factors that they are searching for most frequently include cholesterol levels, blood pressure, in addition to fasting blood sugar.  Most of these tests can enable you to see how your levels compare to normal levels and obviously higher levels should be addressed immediately to help and get rid of any additional health risks.  Certainly, it benefits your health insurance company and your employer much more to give you high blood pressure medications then to pay for you to have a heart attack or a stroke and it's from this standpoint that both of these companies benefit greatly from identifying your health risks early on and getting them under control.

Numerous employees also find that these Health Risk Assessments have helped them to identify the lifestyle changes that they need to make in order to really have a greater impact on improving their own health.  After years of having their risks assessed most individuals at least try and make some of the changes suggested to them in order to improve their health and lessen their risk of coronary failure and stroke. 

The purpose of the HRA program is to educate individuals on the factors that could put them at risk for serious illness and by acknowledging the changes that need to be made most people find it is pretty simple to have a positive impact on their own health.  A Health Risk Assessment benefits everyone.