UAB among 100 Healthiest Employers in America

UAB Employee WellnessUAB Employee Wellness Director Anna Threadcraft, right, and staff member Chrystal Freeman accepted the 100 Healthiest Employers in America award during the Fitbit Captivate Conference in Chicago, Illinois. strives to shape the health of UAB employees with a dynamic schedule of free fitness classes, lunch and learn programs, health screenings and other wellness initiatives designed to help employees be their healthiest in the workplace. Those efforts were recognized earlier this month when UAB was named one of the 100 Healthiest Employers in America for 2017, an awards program presented by Springbuk, a national leader in health care analytics.

"UAB employees inspire us to continue working on innovative ways to create a healthier workplace," said UAB Employee Wellness Director Anna Threadcraft, who accepted the award during the Fitbit Captivate Conference in Chicago, Illinois. "Because of the commitment to health that both campus and hospital employees demonstrate, we’ve become trend setters, leading the way in workplace wellness as well as academics and health care."

Now in its fifth year, Springbuk’s H100 awards program recognizes organizations that have achieved success in improving the health of their employees through wellness programs. UAB was selected from more than 1,800 applicants in more than 40 U.S. cities. According to a Springbuk press release, the applicant pool represents more than 60 million employees, or one-third of the working population.

Companies competing for the Healthiest Employer designation are assessed on six measures: culture and leadership commitment, foundational components, strategic planning, communication and marketing, programming and interventions and reporting and analysis.

UAB Health System CEO Will Ferniany was pleased to see the organization being recognized for its commitment to health.

“UAB’s second name is ‘health,’” Ferniany said. “As an internationally recognized academic medical center and university, the health of our faculty, staff and students is important to us. I am glad that others, such as Fitbit and Springbuk, agree that we are at the vanguard of being a healthy employer.”

Learn more about UAB Employee Wellness initiatives online at uab.edu/wellness.