'Know your numbers' - How Vitality can help your clients better understand their health
Whether it’s wearable fitness devices, personalised wellbeing and nutrition apps or health screenings, it’s never been easier for people to know their numbers, writes Greg Levine.
Nowhere is this truer than in the world of top-flight sport, where wearable tech is revolutionising the way athletes and teams gather performance and health data, to gain a competitive edge.
As we hear in our latest Changing the Game, it’s no longer just on-the-pitch data either. Teams like Rangers FC are monitoring and gathering everything from how much players eat and when, their sleep cycles and mental wellbeing.
We sat down with Rangers FC captain James Tavernier, centre back Kathryn Hill and the club’s medical and performance staff to hear more.
With more of us using wearables and other health and fitness monitoring tools, it’s no longer just elite athletes that are benefiting from better access to health data either.
And, whilst most of us aren’t using the data to optimise sporting performance, knowing our numbers can be key to maintaining a healthy lifestyle, preventing illness and identifying and intervening in any health issues earlier.
With that in mind, here are five ways Vitality can help your clients know their numbers:
Kickstarting behaviour change – online Health Review
Most of us probably think we’re in tip-top health. This overconfidence – optimism bias – means we aren’t as aware as we should be of the impact our lifestyle choices might be having on our health.
By asking people a few simple questions about their health and lifestyle habits and presenting them with their Vitality Age, we can kickstart meaningful behaviour change.
Vitality’s online Health Review is also a great way of getting your clients engaged in the Programme, earning points and embedding the plan into their everyday life.
Preventing health problems - Bluecrest Health Assessment
Even when we do look after ourselves, health issues can often go undetected or undiagnosed until they fully materialise.
This is where measuring and assessing a more extensive range of health markers and risks can be important, for both preventing illness and intervening as early as possible if something is amiss.
A more in-depth, comprehensive Bluecrest Health Assessment offers client’s a full body MOT, checking everything from cardiology, kidney health and stroke risk, alongside an extensive range of other general health indicators.
Available to clients at a discounted rate, these Health Assessments aren’t just another way of unlocking immediate value from a plan, they can also be a lifesaver, as we heard in a recent client case study.
Tracking day-to-day fitness and wellbeing
The benefits of physical activity to our overall physical and mental health are well documented. Despite this, many of us are leading inactive, sedentary lives and not getting enough exercise, adding to other health risks such as poor nutrition and lack of sleep.
Even moderate changes to physical activity can improves someone’s health and life expectancy, which is why the Vitality Programme is built around driving positive behaviour change.
Wearable devices that allow clients to track their daily activity and provide immediate, real-time performance data, can be a particularly effective way of helping them to maintain or improve their fitness and wellbeing.
And it’s not just about running marathons or hitting the gym five times a week. Tracking and improving physical activity can be as simple as going for a brisk walk or doing the gardening.
We also know that when tracking physical activity is incentivised, clients are more likely to engage and are more likely to make the necessary improvements1.
Data and personalisation - Next Best Action
It’s one thing helping clients to know their numbers, but often turning that into meaningful action and positive lifestyle changes requires a more personalised approach.
This is where Vitality’s unique Next Best Action initiative can be especially powerful. By using data from a member’s annual Health Review, we can take a more targeted approach, based on their individual circumstances, to tackle risks such as obesity, diabetes or smoking.
By helping people to better understand their health and the impact of their lifestyle choices, we can in turn help them to change their behaviour and drive significant improvements.
Of those members enrolled on a Next Best Action programme, almost half lost at least 4% of their body weight, 10% reversed their diabetes and 47% quit smoking2.
At a time when overall population health and wellbeing is on the decline, it’s crucial that more of us are better informed and have a clearer picture of our individual health data, to make the right improvements.
By helping clients to more easily check and monitor key health risks, wellbeing markers and levels of physical activity can ultimately help your clients lead longer, healthier lives, whilst unlocking immediate, tangible value from their plan. This is good for them, us an insurer and for you as an adviser.
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2. Vitality Health Claims Insights Report 2023