I recently typed the words “health and wellness” into my favorite search engine and about 91 million results appeared. No exaggeration. These famous words– health and wellness– are hitched at the hip and travel everywhere together. Yet, if you ask people to define the meaning of this linked linguistic staple, the responses always vary:
“It’s all about fitness, popping vitamins, exercising and taking care of yourself.”
“It’s a lifestyle.”
“It means you are trying to keep away from the doctor –health and wellness is better than sick and ornery and high medical bills.”
Interpretations of the phrase “health and wellness” ping back and forth as people reconcile the distinct meanings of two different words, while the diminutive “and” ducks for cover in the middle. We sense that health and wellness don’t mean the same thing and that both words are not equally at fault. If you ask someone, “How’s your health?”, they will almost always get your meaning and quickly oblige with an inventory of their personal afflictions. If you ask people, “How’s your wellness?”, they will ask you to repeat the question.
Our research shows clients and consumers alike lack a fundamental understanding of what “wellness” means. In our work, which included both secondary research as well as primary research with consumers and professionals, we discovered a simple way to help people better understand how the concept of wellness relates to personal health. Most people (and it turns out most formal definitions) describe health as an outcome. For example, The American Heritage Dictionary defines health as “the overall condition of an organism at a given time.” This helps explain why most people have a reasonably good understanding of what health is and can describe the condition of their “personal organism” when asked, “How’s it going?” On the other hand, wellness is not an outcome. It is a way of being that involves choices we make. We can choose to live “well”, regardless of the specific state of health we experience at any one time.
We discovered this notion resonates with people across a wide spectrum of self-described physical health. The idea that “wellness is a choice we make in any state of health” is as true for athletic people in their 20s as it is for people seeking to live “well into” their 80s. When we begin to understand wellness as a choice that is relevant to a large swath of the population, it opens up exciting, new possibilities.
Interviews with patients across a variety of illnesses demonstrate that people become increasingly aware of their wellness choices as they cope with ill health and are interested in wellness support as they manage everything from rheumatoid arthritis to diabetes to cancer. Of course, there are many dimensions to wellness and the type of support required, and it varies across conditions and patient types. However, as the population ages, there is a growing need to take wellness seriously and to pursue new approaches. Why?
- As health care reform advances and focuses on improving outcomes (the health part), it is not surprising that key initiatives include affecting better wellness choices for all.
- As new technology and media enable truly interactive educational forums and personalized content, our ability to affect wellness choices has never been greater.
- As health care professionals, employers, insurers, government and other stakeholders come together to address the needs of society, our understanding of wellness and its profound impact in our lives will only increase.
For all of these reasons, this is an exciting time to be working in the two, connected worlds of health and wellness. It is important work, even if we succeed in only small ways to help people aspire and choose to live as well as is humanly possible.
Download
