Medigold Health Memo

Memo The latest news and advice from your trusted health & wellbeing partner

IN THIS ISSUE: Issue One: June 2021 Healthy Hints Spotlight on... Perform Coffee Break Corner Let's hear it for the boys Meet the COVID Team

Healthy Hints... ...for boosting your mental resilience Last month saw people throughout the UK celebrating Mental Health Awareness Week (10-16 May), but if you missed it, don’t worry – starting conversations about mental health and promoting awareness of how we can all proactively invest in our wellbeing is something we should be focusing on all year round.

With more of us than usual having experienced increased levels of stress, anxiety, or low mood over the past year as a result of the challenges and uncertainty brought about by the coronavirus pandemic, finding ways to boost our mental resilience is more important now than ever. Here, we share our top tips: Go outdoors Spending just 20-30 minutes a day in nature is proven to reduce stress levels – exposure to natural light can help to boost our mood, while focusing on the pleasant sights and sounds of the natural world distracts us from negative thoughts and worries, helping us to feel calmer.

Get active Exercise is just as important for our mental fitness as it is for our physical health. As well as releasing feel-good hormones, physical activity, particularly when it involves picking up a new skill, forces us to concentrate on something other than what’s bothering us and can also help to improve our self-esteem. Exercising in nature is even better!

Stay connected Having a good support network is really important for our wellbeing. Try to schedule in time to regularly catch up with your friends or family, even if it’s just over the phone.

Talking to people who care for us about how we’re feeling and sharing our problems can help us to feel less isolated, and they may be able to give you a fresh perspective or even help you to find solutions.

Challenge unhelpful thoughts When we feel depressed or anxious, it can be easy to fall into unhelpful patterns of thinking, dwelling on negative thoughts, catastrophising, and criticising ourselves Artificial intelligence gets real overly harshly. Learning to spot when you are

having these types of thoughts and writing them down can help you to deal with them more objectively. Don’t be too hard on yourself - think about what you’d say to a friend if they were feeling the same way, and try to come up with three positive thoughts for every negative one. Over time, this will become a habit and help you to develop a more positive mindset.

Seek support if you need to Not all of these tips will work for everyone if your feelings of anxiety and low mood persist, or they are starting to have a real impact on your day-to-day life, it’s important to seek appropriate support, whether that’s via your employer’s EAP (Employee Assistance Programme) or your own GP.

Spotlight on...

In April, we launched Medigold Health Perform, our new suite of mental health services designed to help our clients adopt a more proactive, preventative approach to employee wellbeing.

Perform brings together our existing clinical and therapeutic support services (including our industry-leading Employee Assistance Programme and specialist counselling service) with a range of new wellbeing programmes, workshops, and proven self-care tools, all centred around two core areas: Engagement & Resilience – these programmes help you to raise awareness and embed a positive wellbeing culture at all levels of your organisation, while

supporting your teams to proactively manage their own mental health and build their mental resilience.

Balance & Performance – these programmes focus on enhancing the workplace performance of your teams and equipping them with the tools they need to achieve their full potential and reach new heights.

All our programmes have been designed to complement each other, enabling you to easily create a structured mental health strategy that’s tailor-made for your business and supports you to achieve your wellbeing goals.

Coffee Break Corner According to the charity Drinkaware, during the first lockdown in 2020, 1 in 10 adult drinkers in the UK reported drinking more than usual.

For many, this increase in drinking was situational and temporary, the result of having more time to spend at home and less structure during their day.

However, the fact that, in December, more than half of people who were already drinking at higher risk levels (more than 35 units a week for women and more than 50 for men) prior to the pandemic were still drinking more than they would usually is deeply concerning, indicating that for some, the changes in drinking behaviour made during the lockdowns may have become ingrained.

Given the long-term health implications of harmful drinking and the potential for the effects of alcohol misuse to spill over into the workplace, it’s important for employers to be aware of the signs to look out for so that they can ensure any employee who may be struggling with an alcohol or other drug dependency has access to the support they need.

The education and awareness training that we provide through our alcohol and drug testing division, Hampton Knight, focuses on teaching both your managers and your workers about: the different types of drugs, their effects, and the risks that misuse poses in the workplace how to spot the signs and symptoms of substance misuse their legal responsibilities what to do if they suspect someone at work is misusing alcohol or drugs the counselling support we provide and how to access it

If you’re looking to introduce an alcohol and drug-testing programme, or would like support with reviewing your policy or delivering training for your colleagues, please contact:

salesenquiries@hamptonknight.co.uk

LET'S HEAR IT FOR THE BOYS! Men’s Health Week, 14-20 June 2021

Did you know that globally,

and at higher-risk levels.

The shocking stats 75% of premature

men die, on average, six years earlier than women? Or that in

Culture and Attitudes

deaths from coronary

the UK, 20% of men (that’s 1 in

Traditional beliefs around

heart disease are male

5) will die before the age of 65?

masculinity mean that men are more likely to delay seeking

Men have a 37% higher risk of dying from

Most of these deaths occur due

help for health problems,

to reasons that are largely

feeling that they should simply

preventable, so what’s behind

‘man up’ and ‘just get on with

the worrying statistics?

things’. This means that they

that affect both men

often don’t visit their doctor

and women

Awareness and Lifestyle

until a much later stage in an

Men and boys typically engage

illness, when treatments are

less with their health than

likely to be less effective.

women: they are less likely to talk about health issues with

Employers can play a crucial

their friends or peers; tend to

role in raising awareness among

have much lower levels of

working-age men of the health

symptom awareness; are less

issues that disproportionately

likely to make use of primary

affect them. Men’s Health

care and preventative services;

Week, run by the Men’s Health

and often lead unhealthier

Forum, is the perfect

lifestyles – 67% of men are

opportunity to get your male

overweight or obese, and they

employees to start engaging

tend to smoke and drink more

with their own health.

cancer generally, and a 67% higher chance of dying from cancers

Middle-aged men are twice as likely to develop diabetes and twice as likely to be undiagnosed

4 out of 5 suicides are by men and suicide is the biggest cause of death in men under 35

The Big Three

Move more, drink less and if you’re a smoker, seek support to quit. It’s

Here are the top three things

also important that you attend any

every man should be doing right

health screening you are offered -

now to reduce their risk of the

from the age of 40, all men are

three biggest killers:

entitled to a free midlife MOT from the NHS, to check your risk

Cancer

factors for developing CVD and

The most common types of

other common diseases, such as

cancer in men are prostate,

diabetes and kidney disease.

bowel, and lung cancer (along with testicular cancer in men

Mental health

between the ages of 15 and 49).

If you’re struggling with low mood,

Educate yourself on the

depression, or anxiety, don’t shrug

symptoms, get to know what’s

it off - talk to your family and

normal for your body, and if you

friends about how you’re feeling.

notice a change, don’t wait to go

Starting conversations about your

and get checked out by your GP –

own mental health may also

cancer is much more treatable

encourage others to open up

when caught early.

about theirs – listen and take it seriously when they do.

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) Making positive lifestyle changes can help to reduce your risk of stroke and heart disease.

Medigold Health can also provide workplace lifestyle screening days.

Contact your Account Manager to find out more.

Meet the

COVID

Team...

In every edition, we’ll be introducing you to some of the colleagues working in different teams across the Medigold Health Group, to give you an insight into our amazing people and help you put a face to the name!

This time, we meet three members of our COVID Team, who are responsible for coordinating our COVID testing service, which we launched back in 2020 to support our clients to keep their businesses operating safely during the pandemic.

Gary Stohrer - COVID Manager Having worked for Medigold Health since 2017, I was appointed COVID Manager at Hampton Knight in November 2020. I now oversee the COVID Team, coordinating all testing and the reporting of results back to our clients.

I love the friendly working environment and flexibility the company offers, and how everyone is always so supportive of one another.

Emma Wall - COVID Data Administrator I’ve worked for Medigold Health since 2013 and my role within the COVID Administration Team involves arranging PCR and Lateral Flow testing for our clients’ employees and assisting them with any queries. I love the team I work with and how varied my role is – no day is the same!

Rachel McLauchlan - COVID Co-ordinator I joined Medigold Health in 2015 and now work as a COVID Co-Ordinator arranging PCR testing for rail industry clients. I love how supportive my team is - even though we’re all now working from home, there’s always someone on the end of the phone to help when you need it.