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. 2011 Jan;53(1):8-16.
doi: 10.1097/JOM.0b013e31820451fd.

The impact of weight gain or loss on health care costs for employees at the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies

Ginger Smith Carls  1 , Ron Z Goetzel, Rachel Mosher Henke, Jennifer Bruno, Fikry Isaac, Janice McHugh
Affiliations

The impact of weight gain or loss on health care costs for employees at the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies

Ginger Smith Carls et al. J Occup Environ Med. 2011 Jan.

Abstract

Objective: To quantify the impact of weight gain or weight loss on health care costs.

Methods: Employees completing at least two health risk assessments during 2002 to 2008 were classified as adding, losing, or staying at high/low risk for each of the nine health risks including overweight and obesity. Models for each risk were used to compare cost trends by controlling for employee characteristics.

Results: Employees who developed high risk for obesity (n = 405) experienced 9.9% points higher annual cost increases (95% confidence interval: 3.0%-16.8%) than those who remained at lower risk (n = 8015). Employees who moved from high to lower risk for obesity (n = 384), experienced annual cost increases that were 2.3% points lower (95% confidence interval: -7.4% to 2.8%) than those who remained high risk (n = 1699).

Conclusions: Preventing weight gain through effective employee health promotion programs is likely to result in cost savings for employers.

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