Workers say regular wellness reviews would help improve productivity ⁰

Over half of UK employees are struggling to make long-term changes to their lifestyles, but believe they could adopt healthier practices with more help from their employers, new research by Bupa claims.  In the study of 2,000 UK employees, 52 percent admitted that their changes generally last no longer than a few weeks, and just 7 percent have been completely successful. But more than 85 percent of employees believe they would be more productive if they were able to stick to positive lifestyle changes in the long-term, two in five (44 percent) would love their work to help them make positive changes to their lifestyle and half (48 percent) say a regular wellness review would help with this. The research showed that three quarters of employees (73 percent) have chosen to change their lifestyle to feel more physically healthy, with nearly half (46 percent) changing to improve mental health.

The top behaviours people are trying to change are exercising more (65 percent), losing weight (61 percent), and eating less sugar (48 percent).  But people clearly need support to help them achieve these goals as they are being held back by a lack of willpower (41 percent) and their busy lives (40 percent).

Dr Steven Luttrell, Medical Director at Bupa UK said: “Clearly we all want to be healthier, but currently don’t feel supported to reach our goals and this means we are struggling to make our health resolutions stick.

“Improving the wellbeing of workers in the UK needs a proactive effort, yet unfortunately many employers are failing to see the value of health and wellbeing initiatives. By supporting staff to make positive lifestyle changes, employers can also benefit from healthy and productive workforce.”

The research is part of Bupa UK’s launch of a new range of health assessments, which it says are designed to help businesses engage their employees in their health and wellbeing and create a healthier, more productive workforce.