When you receive your annual health screening, one of the things that you get tested for is your cholesterol level. Cholesterol is a waxy, fat-like substance that's found in all cells of your body. Your body needs cholesterol to help produce certain hormones, cell membranes, vitamin D, and bile acids that aid your digestive system.

Many adults are hard-wired to believe that cholesterol is bad for your health. This is only partly true. High levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol (the bad type of cholesterol) can lead to an increased risk of heart disease. However, high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol (the good kind of cholesterol) is great for your overall health and helps reduce your risk of developing heart disease.

According to WebMD, HDL cholesterol can help reduce your risk of heart disease by: 

• Removing LDL cholesterol
• Transporting LDL cholesterol it to the liver where it can be reprocessed
• Acting as the maintenance crew for the inner walls of your blood vessels – HDL scrubs the wall clean and keeps it healthy 

A lot of workplace wellness tips focus on the importance of physical health, but employees should know that mental health is just as important! Between long hours, built-up stress, and a heavy workload, being a full-time employee can take its toll on your mental wellbeing. In fact, one in four Americans identified work as being a source of anxiety.

Taking care of yourself mentally is one of the most important things you can do for your health and wellness. Maintaining a healthy mind helps you cope better with stress, relate with others, and make rational decisions. Good mental wellbeing can also help you feel more productive and accomplished at work.

Ignoring your mental health can lead to some serious health consequences. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), approximately one in five American adults (or 43.8 million) experience mental illness in a given year. This is a sobering statistic that should remind both employees and employers why it’s so important to prioritize mental wellbeing. 

By simply adopting some healthy habits, you can stay mentally healthy at work. Below are 15 tips to help you prioritize your mental wellbeing at work.

Earth Day is this Sunday, April 22. Although Earth Day lands on a weekend this year, there’s no reason not to celebrate it all workweek long! Earth Day is an excellent time to learn about how environmental factors affect employee health and wellness.

Employers can utilize Earth Day to help employees appreciate nature and get more involved in their community. We think it’s a great idea for employers to start some earth-friendly wellness initiatives for the week of April 23^rd -27^th. Doing so will inspire employees to take better care of their surrounding environment and spend more time outdoors. 

Below are ten ideas to help you celebrate Earth Day at your company while also boosting employee wellness: 

Eating healthily can be difficult. Eating healthily while being a full-time employee with a hectic schedule can sometimes seem next to impossible. However, it’s so important to maintain a healthy diet – especially when you’re feeling overly stressed. A balanced diet will keep you energized, focused, and help reduce your risk of chronic disease.

Since we know you’re busy, we rounded up nine delicious, healthy recipes that are perfect for a busy workweek. With how quick and easy these recipes are, there’s no excuse to opt out for fast food! Try out some of these meals the next time you’re in a rush:

Breakfast

What’s deemed as the most important meal of the day can sometimes be the most inconvenient meal of the day. It’s hard enough getting to work on time, much less spending thirty minutes in the kitchen cooking a nutritious meal. You might be tempted to grab a greasy breakfast burrito on your way to the office, but all the fat, sugar, and calories of a fast food breakfast is one of the worst ways to start your workday! Check out these quick, healthy breakfasts that you can whip up in no time: 

When was the last time you evaluated how your workplace wellness program is running? If you haven’t dusted off the cobwebs in a while, there’s no better time than now to re-evaluate and do some major spring cleaning! There are a few ways you can tell if you have an ailing corporate wellness program on your hands.

First, if you have low participation, your program is most likely struggling. The most obvious way to evaluate your wellness program is to crunch the numbers. If there are only a few people that have even signed up for your program, it’s probably time to make a few changes. 

Second, if you have decent participation, but aren’t seeing any health behavior changes, your program might need some adjustments. High participation and low improvement can mean a few different things. Most likely, it means that your employees are just going through the motions – they aren’t truly engaged in your program. Engagement is what drives results, so it’s important to recognize when you’re missing the mark on that side of your program. 

TotalWellness has some exciting news! We added four new awesome features to our wellness program, Beata. Beata is a turnkey wellness solution powered through a user-friendly portal. Utilizing a wellness portal is an easy way for busy employers to manage an effective workplace wellness program. 

Beata was designed to engage employees, encourage healthy behavior, and boost participation levels. It also helps simplify the overall process of a wellness program for both the employer and the employee. That’s why we consider Beata your “no sweat” wellness portal. It takes out all the hassle and stress of a wellness program so that employers and employees can focus on what’s truly important: employee health and wellness.

We built Beata on the power of positivity. It was designed specifically to help employers empower their employees to live healthier, happier lives. We removed all of the nonsense, and focused solely on features that truly help employees transform into the healthiest version of themselves.

Spring is finally in the air! Warmer weather and blooming flowers are awesome motivators for getting more active and boosting your health. Plus, summer is just around the corner! Many of us lose a bit of motivation to lead healthy lifestyles during the winter months – mainly due to the holidays, cold weather, and less daylight. Picking things back up during the springtime will help you get back on track before the summer months take over!

One of the best ways to get back into the swing of things is to challenge yourself to some mini wellness challenges. Wellness challenges are a fun way to pick up on new healthy habits. From now until June 21^st (the first day of summer), we challenge you to boost your health and happiness this spring with some of these mini wellness challenges:

If a hot cup of coffee is the first thing you think about after waking up in the morning, you’re not alone! According to research from Villanova University, about 90% of Americans consume caffeine in one form or another every single day. With more than half of American adults consuming more than 300 milligrams of caffeine each day, caffeine consumption isn't dying down anytime soon. 

For many full-time employees, consuming caffeine is an easy way to get a quick jolt of energy and feel more productive in the office. However, choosing unhealthy caffeinated beverages or going overboard with caffeine can lead to some negative health consequences – which is why it’s important to make healthy choices when getting your caffeine fix. Below are five tips to help you enjoy caffeine without it disrupting your health:

Biometric screenings are a fantastic tool for employers to utilize.

Screenings are an easy way to get employees involved in your workplace wellness initiatives and learn more about their current health status. They provide helpful information for both employers and employees by collecting health data that can be translated into actionable goals. It’s a convenient and free opportunity for employees to take a more active role in their health and gain some motivation to develop healthier habits. 

Typically, a biometric screening consists of a simple finger prick or venipuncture blood draw and measures the following health factors: 

• Body Mass Index (BMI)
• Blood pressure
• Waist circumference
• Glucose
• Total cholesterol
• HDL and LDL cholesterol
• Triglycerides

Offering an annual biometric screening is an essential step in creating a successful employee wellness program. The results provide a baseline for employee health, and employers can use these results to track wellness progress, trends, and changes over time. Most screening providers provide an aggregate report after your company’s screening has been completed. While these reports are beneficial for collecting data, many employers aren’t exactly sure what to do with this data.

Stress is inevitable. It’s a part of life and, unfortunately, a part of office culture. Most employees deal with stressful situations or obligations on a regular basis. According to a 2017 survey by Paychex, over 60% of employees said that they felt stressed three or more workdays per week. This stress can lead to chronic stress or eventual burnout, which can both negatively impact physical and mental health.

Since stress can’t necessarily be avoided, it’s important to learn how to handle and cope with stress in a healthy way. Some employees might turn to alcohol, smoking cigarettes, gambling, or other risky behaviors to cope with stress, but these unhealthy habits only make things worse. To truly manage work-related stress, employees need to prioritize their physical, emotional, and mental wellbeing.

If you are starting to feel the signs of chronic stress, it’s urgent to learn coping skills before it’s too late. Chronic stress can lead to high blood pressure, heart problems, digestive issues, chronic aches and pains, and much more. There are many healthy habits that employees can practice to better deal with stress. Below are 12 habits of employees who handle stress like a boss that you can try out for yourself!