Employers and employees earn awards for wellness

Each year, participants of Get Fit Get Healthy (GFGH), an employee wellness program, are nominated as Champions of Wellness. GFGH is part of Goshen Health’s Business Health Advantage services to help meet the needs of employers in building a healthier workforce and increasing access to health care.
 
To promote wellness during the pandemic required more ingenuity than in past years.The three employers who earned awards were:

• Kountry Wood Products took 1^st Place Large Employer for being the first company after the COVID-19 shutdown to offer health screenings (including blood pressures, blood lab work and weigh-ins) for their employees. They also supported safe onsite wellness coaching, lunch and learn meetings as well as a presentation by a doctor on COVID-19.

• Hertzler Systems took 1^st Place Small Employer for promoting wellness with a points program that enabled them to bridge the gap of working remotely. In addition to ending the year with a six-week exercise challenge, they held weekly virtual coffee breaks to get together, connect and catch up on their lives and families.

• Jayco earned the Wellness Warrior Award for going above and beyond for their employees during the pandemic as well as providing support for Goshen Health and first-responders. For their employees, they provided temperature checks early on, as well as locations for employees to get free COVID-19 testing. For Goshen Health, Jayco donated a large number of gloves and provided an RV for patient visits at the Urgent Care Center. In addition, Jayco donated one RV unit to the Middlebury Fire Department to use as a quarantine space in case one of their firefighters became infected.  

Among the employees who earned awards were

• Rem Yoder, DJ Construction, earned a Champion of Wellness Award for his leading by example. He is an avid cycler, averaging 100-175 miles a week. He identified his motivators and harnessed them to reach his goals.

• Jose Ramirez, Entech, received the Most Improved Award. Jose traded out soft drinks for water and changed his eating habits to reduce his triglycerides significantly.   

“The programs we offer through Business Health Advantage allow us to reach a large portion of our community by partnering with employers who share our mission of wanting to improve the health of our community,” said Randy Christophel, President and CEO of Goshen Health. “We’re always gratified to see how employers invest in their employees and support them to achieve better health through health screenings, education and coaching. The employees who participate in these programs not only achieve better health, but also serve as inspiration for their families, friends and co-workers.”