The University of Iowa Healthier Workforce Center for Excellence (HWCE) in the College of Public Health hosted the “Total Worker Health Symposium: Safe, Healthy and Cost-Effective Solutions” on November 29-30, at the Marriott Hotel in Coralville, IA. The symposium brought together national experts from across the country, from federal government agencies and from here in Iowa. In all, over 120 people from 18 states and Washington DC were in attendance.
NIOSH Director, Dr. John Howard, provided strong opening comments emphasizing prevention as the central feature of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PACA). “When you look at the cost-containment strategy within the act, you can sum it up on one word, prevention. Prevention is the cost-containment strategy embedded in the PACA and prevention is something that we in occupational safety and health do all the time. It’s something employers care very much about, it’s something that workers care very much about and it’s something worker’s families care very much about.”
“The symposium addressed issues of immediate concern to Iowa workers and employers – how to make the workplace safer and healthier, how to increase productivity and how to control health care costs,” says James Merchant, HWCE director and professor of occupational and environmental health. A central theme for the symposium was the introduction of the concept of Total Worker Health™, a strategy from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) integrating occupational safety and health protection with health promotion to prevent worker injury and illness and to advance health and well-being.
View agenda and download presentation slides