Welcome to the winter edition of the FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter.

We are a little late with getting this one out, but the content is still relevant, especially given the recent cold snap.

This newsletter focuses on the five essential elements of wellness, warding off the winter blues, exercise tips over winter and also explains why we gain weight over winter.

Please click here to view or download.

We hope you enjoy it.

Continue reading FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter - July 2010

Welcome to another edition of the FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter.

With winter emerging quickly (bummer!), this issue is devoted to preventing winter illnesses and maintaining good health.

This month’s newsletter can be viewed and/or downloaded by clicking here.

Please feel free to pass this onto your colleagues and friends.

We hope you enjoy it.

Continue reading FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter - April 2010

FitSense Australia has just released our February 2010 Wellness Newsletter. This month’s newsletter focuses on the difficult topic of taking responsibility for your own health.

This newsletter can be viewed and downloaded here.

Continue reading FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter - February 2010

The conclusion to another year is upon us again. As we all know the holiday period is a time where we generally eat too much and exercise too little.

The December edition of FitSense’s Wellness Newsletter will provide you with some tips on how to address this through holiday fitness and smart festive eating.

The Newsletter is available to be viewed and downloaded here. I hope you find it to be beneficial.

We will be back in 2010 after a short Christmas break.

Continue reading FitSense Australia Wellness Newsletter - December 2009

On October 22nd, the winners of the 2009 Safe Work ACT Awards were announced.

As part of these awards, there is a ‘Best Workplace Health and Wellbeing Program’ award. It is great to see that health and wellness is being recognised at this event.

FitSense Australia would like to congratulate the 2009 winner of this award, ActewAGL, for the implementation of such a comprehensive staff health program. It shows just how much the organisation values the health of their staff. FitSense Australia has assisted in the delivery of ActewAGL’s program since 2006 and we thoroughly enjoy working with an organisation who genuinely wants to assist their staff.

Details of the awards can be found here, while a copy of a Canberra Times articles on this ward can be viewed here.

Continue reading Safe Work ACT Awards

Earlier this year, WorkSafe Victorian started rolling out their WorkHealth program. The program offers free worker health checks to organisations within Victoria. The health checks are a short (15-20 minutes) one-on-one assessment with a health professional and includes an assessment of:

• Blood Pressure
• Cholesterol
• Blood Glucose (Diabetes screening)
• Waist Circumference
• Nutrition
• Alcohol consumption
• Physical activity

The health checks will assist staff to improve their health which in turn assists the organisation to improve productivity. The health checks are delivered onsite meaning that both employers and employees can benefit from this program without even leaving the office.

FitSense Australia has been an Endorsed Service Provider of health checks since August and would like to invite Victorian organisations to participate.

For more information on the WorkHealth health checks click here, or to apply for your free health check download the application form.

Continue reading FitSense - Endorsed WorkHealth Service Provider

Last week, FitSense Australia launched the Online Wellness Centre (OWC). The OWC is an online tool aimed at assisting individuals to monitor and improve their health.

As with most IT projects, our OWC took a bit longer than originally planned, but the wait was worth it. It currently offers the following tools:

• Online health assessment (HRA - health risk assessment)
• Optional post-assessment follow up phone call
• Company health status reports
• Online seminars
• Health library - concise and practical fact sheets on everything you need to know about your health

The OWC is an ideal way of targetting regional staff, complementing your current health program, or offering a cost effective method of improving the health in a large organisation.

The OWC is currently undergoing it’s first trial with approximately 400 users. Further features will then be added in 2010. This includes an online exercise coach, allowing users to get individually tailored exercise programs, and a series of interactive quizzes.

If you have any questions about the OWC, or would like a free trial or quote for your organisation, please contact us.

Continue reading FitSense Launches Online Wellness Centre

FitSense is about to release a new weight loss coaching service. The service is aimed to assist individuals loss weight as part of a workplace wellness program. The key to a successful program in this environment is offering something that works, but is budget friendly and can be done on a large scale if needed. Therefore, our program is based around regular coaching via phone.

Therefore we were happy to read a recent article (Digenio, Ann Antern Med, Feb 2009) that showed that weight loss program provided over the phone were equally effective as face to face programs. The few was to ensure regular contact in order to offer the participant support and motivation.

So keep your eyes open over the coming months as we release our new weight loss program.

Continue reading Dialling In For Weight Loss

A report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare earlier this year showed some positive signs for Australians. It was estimated that in 2006, less Australians died as a result of heart disease than in the 4 decades prior to that.

However, heart disease remains the leading cause of death for Australians with a large portion of the population at risk. Factors that increase the risk of heart disease include smoking, obesity, high blood cholesterol, diabetes and high blood pressure.

It is good to know we are on the improve, with death rates decreasing, but there is still plenty of work to be done.

Continue reading Less Australians Dying from Heart Disease

A recent poll commissioned by Lifeline Australia showed that 87% of Australian workers were stressed. The major causes of stress were work (73%) and money (66%). However, health was also a prominent cause of stress.

Stress can also have numerous impacts on ones health, and 40% of respondents reported ‘unhealthy’ levels of stress. So workers are stressing about their health, which in turn leads to poorer health.

The ability to assist staff to improve their health can not only improve staff health, but lead to greater productivity and reduced absenteeism.

So it is a smart idea to have a corporate health program, as you can assist your staff to reduce their stress levels by improving their health!

Continue reading Staff Are Stressed Over Their Health