- Cummins opened a holistic LiveWell Center in Columbus, Indiana. Nearly 9,000 employees and their family members (a total of 17,000) live within a 20 mile radius of the Center.
- The clinic focuses on preventing healthcare problems through lifestyle services including stress management, exercise counseling, and nutrition classes, in addition to primary and urgent care.
- It is too early to have data available about cost savings or health outcomes, but the Cummins LiveWell Center has generated significant interest from the media and other companies hoping to replicate it.
Summary
In 2016, the power generation corporation, Cummins Inc., opened a 28,000-square-foot LiveWell Center in Columbus, Indiana for its employees and family members. The center offers a wide variety of services that targets not just traditional healthcare but also lifestyle education and coaching. According to Premise Health – the medical services provider for the Cummins LiveWell Center, Cummins hopes to take a preventative approach to employee health to improve well-being while simultaneously bringing down the cost of healthcare.[1]
Currently, the Cummins LiveWell Center employs several physicians as well as a nurse practitioner. Premise Health states that the center has 46 employees with five full-time physician positions and visiting specialists. Services include primary care, urgent care, physical therapy, preventative services, lifestyle coaching and services, and occupational health. In fact, as a part of its lifestyle focus, the center hosts cooking classes, one-on-one exercise counseling, stress tests, and massages. All services are at a flat-cost, and some (including the exercise physiologist counseling, labs, preventative/health-coaching primary care) are free.[2]
Why It Stands Out
The Cummins LiveWell Center represents an innovative approach to employee wellness: build an off-site center dedicated to improving holistic employee health. The center, which is close enough to headquarters for easy access, tackles not just treatment but prevention,[3] reflecting the shifting paradigm in healthcare. In addition, the focus on prevention of chronic diseases via stress management, exercise counseling, and nutritional education – all of which Cummins tries to keep affordable for its employees – may prove beneficial both to healthcare costs and employee health outcomes in the long run.
Although the Cummins LiveWell Center has generated much interest and several anecdotal success stories, there isn’t much data available yet on cost savings or health outcomes. Many are confident that the Cummins LiveWell Center will generate positive results, and many companies are watching the project with interest in replicating Cummins’ success.
- “What Is LiveWell?,” Cummins LiveWell Center, 2017, http://www.cumminslivewell.com.
- “Cummins LiveWell Center Fee Structure” (Cummins LiveWell Center, November 2016), http://cumminslivewell.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/LiveWell_FeeStructure_11_2016.pdf.
- “Our Services,” Cummins LiveWell Center, 2017, http://www.cumminslivewell.com/our-services/.
