PR: HEALTHY SHASTA IGNITES THE WORKPLACE WELLNESS COLLABORATIVE TO IMPROVE HEALTH AT WORK!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DATE: 12/7/2023
CONTACT: Anna Blasco, Community Education Specialist, 530-229-8456

HEALTHY SHASTA IGNITES THE WORKPLACE WELLNESS COLLABORATIVE TO IMPROVE HEALTH AT WORK!

SHASTA COUNTY – Healthy Shasta ignites the Workplace Wellness Collaborative to improve community health while at work. Eleven organizations from various industries are working together to improve employee wellness in Shasta County. Local employers who want to improve employee wellness are invited to join the bimonthly meetings. Discussions are centered around boosting wellness resources, collaborating on new solutions, implementing best practices, and touring workplaces to see wellness programs in action.

This collaborative comes together at a crucial time, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently released a statement urging employers to modify working conditions for American workers to address the dramatically increased reports of anxiety, depression, and burnout among health workers, which have more than doubled from 2018 to 2022. Poor mental health outcomes and burnout among health workers were at crisis levels in 2018 and has increased due to reported bullying, verbal abuse, and other actions from patients and coworkers during the COVID-19 pandemic. This issue is not unique to the healthcare industry. Mental Health America assessed the perceptions of more than 11,000 workers across 17 industries in the U.S. in 2021 and found that nearly 80 percent of workers surveyed reported that their workplace stress affects their relationships with friends, family, and coworkers.

Fortunately, employers can take measures to alleviate burnout. Employers in Shasta County are already improving working conditions and wellness programs to support employee wellness. During October, 89 different walking teams were formed in local workplaces to compete in the Healthy Shasta Walktober Challenge, with more than 900 local workers walking close to 100,000 miles for their health.

Dr. Paul R. Davis D.O., a Family Physician and Chief of Medicine at the Redding Rancheria Tribal Health Systems said, “As a healthcare provider, one of the hardest parts of my job is ‘walking the walk.’ My job is to maintain and optimize my own health as an example to my patients, such as getting fresh fruit from the break room when I am hungry instead of a snack from the vending machine, going to a lunch hour yoga class, or exercising in the gym. I am lucky to work for an organization that goes out of the way to help staff stay healthy.”

Joining the Healthy Shasta Workplace Wellness Collaborative is a great step towards improving employee well-being in your organization.

Zachary Zeller, CMSS, the Patient Education and Health Promotion Manager at Shasta Community Health Center shared, “After attending the first meeting, I’m excited to continue meeting and interacting with representatives from different agencies. I’m looking forward to not only creating one-on-one relationships, but also lifting each other up as a whole and creating a better work environment for everyone.”

Improving wellness in the workplace is important for both large and small organizations. If you are interested in growing wellness at your workplace or want to learn more about the Healthy Shasta Workplace Wellness Collaborative, reach out to Anna Blasco at ablasco@shastacounty.gov.

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Healthy Shasta is a collaborative committed to making the ‘healthy choice the easy choice’ where you live, work and play.