Occupational Medicine & Health Affairs
Open Access

Review Article

Non-Communicable Disease Prevention and Worksite Health Promotion Programs: A Brief Review

UCT/MRC Research Unit for Exercise Science and Sports Medicine, Department of Human Biology, School of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town, South Africa

*Corresponding Author:

Tracy Kolbe-Alexander
MRC/UCT Research Unit for Exercise Science and Sports Medicine
Department of Human Biology, Faculty of Health Sciences
University of Cape Town Private Bag, South Africa
Tel: 27 21 650 5126
Fax: 27 21 686 7530
E-mail: Tracy.Kolbe-Alexander@uct.ac.za

Received date: September 28, 2013; Accepted date: November 20, 2013; Published date: November 27, 2013

Citation: Kolbe-Alexander TL, Lambert EV (2013) Non-Communicable Disease Prevention and Worksite Health Promotion Programs: A Brief Review. Occup Med Health Aff 1:141. doi: 10.4172/2329-6879.1000141

Copyright: © 2013 Kolbe-Alexander TL, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Introduction: Non-communicable diseases (NCD’s) accounted for nearly two-thirds of global deaths in 2008. The aim of this literature review is to examine current evidence for the role of worksite health promotion programs’ role in the prevention of NCD’s. The prevalence of risk factors for NCD’s among employees and the clustering of risk behaviors among employees will be discussed. In addition, the role of health risk appraisals as an entry for worksite health promotion programs is discussed. Methods: The search strategy included using Pub Med to find relevant manuscripts. Manuscripts that were published within the last 10 years, as well as systematic reviews and meta-analyses were given priority due to the limited scope of this review. Results: Worksite health promotion programs have been shown to result in economic benefits both for the employer and employee. In addition to the economic benefits, previous research has shown that worksite health promotion programs are effective in reducing the risk for NCD’s among employees. Comprehensive worksite health promotion programs which include tailoring the program according to the company’s and employees’ needs have been found to be most effective. In addition, worksite intervention programs that have had the greatest impact on improving employee health were those targeting the employees at highest risk for NCD’s. The Health Risk Assessment (HRA) is one of the most frequently implemented worksite health promotion programs and has been implemented in more than 50% of large companies in the USA by 2004. The HRA is beneficial to identify employees who might be at increased risk for NCD, and could be considered as the first step towards improved health. Conclusion: Worksite health promotion programs have the potential to play a role in reducing the prevalence of NCD’s and their risk factors and both health and economic benefits.

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