More than 800 attend forum on health, productivity

WASHINGTON--More than 800 members of the employer, employee benefits and disability management vendor communities attended the Joint Forum on Health, Productivity and Absence Management in Washington from Nov. 28-30.

The annual meeting is co-sponsored by the Washington-based National Business Group on Health and the San Francisco-based Integrated Benefits Institute.

This year's event, whose theme was "Making Health-related Productivity Your Business Focus," included preconference employer-only workshops on such topical issues as management of obesity in the workplace, health risk management and building a return-to-work culture.

In addition, numerous other conference sessions delved into such topics as pharmacy benefit plan design, consumer-driven health care, the impact of health-related lost time and the value of smoking cessation programs.

Next year's NBGH/IBI Joint Forum is scheduled for Oct. 22-24 and will also be held in Washington. For more information, visit the IBI's Web site at www.ibiweb.org.