At More U.S. Workplaces, Smokers Need Not Apply

1/13/2012
Following the lead of the Cleveland Clinic and a growing number of other hospitals, Pennsylvania's Geisinger Health System will turn away job applicants who smoke starting next month. "This is quite a trend. Hospital systems throughout the country are doing this increasingly," said Dr. Michael Siegel, a professor of community health sciences at Boston University School of Public Health. The move further flames a debate between workers' rights organizations and health advocates over whether denying jobs based on tobacco use is just. Some argue it's a form of employment discrimination, while organizations that adopt such standards, including Geisinger, say that turning away smokers reduces health care costs and absenteeism, and sets a healthy example.
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One Simple Secret to a More Successful Business

1/11/2012
Want to make your business more financially successful? A more diverse work force could be the key. So reports a study led by Ryerson University professor, Kristyn Scott, which found that diversity in the workplace leads to happier workers, which leads, in turn, to greater loyalty and productivity, ultimately enhancing a company's bottom line. Scott and the study's coauthors, Professor Joanna Heathcote of the University of Toronto at Scarborough, and Professor Jamie Gruman at the University of Guelph, reviewed about 100 studies conducted between 1991 and 2009.
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Can electronic health records erase disparities?

1/9/2012
Switching to electronic health records might help close health gaps between black and white Americans, researchers suggest in a new study. Using government data on primary care visits from 2007 to 2008, they found a racial gap in well-controlled blood pressure among doctors who didn't use digital records, but not among those who did. That could be important, because African Americans are more likely to have high blood pressure than whites, which might in turn explain why they also have more heart attacks, strokes and kidney disease, said Dr. Lipika Samal, who worked on the new study.
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Journey Toward Inclusion

1/5/2012
Sparrow Hospital and Health System could be a case study in diversity. Actually, it already has been. A 2009 benchmarking survey report from the Institute for Diversity in Health Management, an affiliate of the American Hospital Association, determined that at Sparrow, diversity is seen as an opportunity and not an issue. The all-inclusive workforce strategy of this area's largest health system, which has two Lansing campuses and three affiliate hospitals, is to create an environment that aligns with the communities it serves, says Jacqueline Thomas-Hall, director of diversity and inclusion/pastoral care at Sparrow.
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