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Are you ready for wellness coaching?
By Jan Brogan
Globe Correspondent January 2, 2012
For a long time, Tania Cooper tried to ignore her health
problems. She was upset by her rapid weightgain, but she didnt want
to believe she had high blood pressure, sleep apnea, or diabetes.
Thats whatold people got, she says.
She didnt take her medication, and she refused to sleep with the
prescribed apnea mask. The34-year-old single mother of three girls
says she put her health on the back burner.
She became exhausted, anxious, and prone to headaches. One day
she looked down at the scale and sawthat the number had topped her
pregnancy weights. And Id had really big babies, she says.
Cooper, who was also diagnosed with polycystic ovarian syndrome,
a hormonal imbalance oftenassociated with weight gain, diabetes,
and sleep apnea, found that no amount of dieting worked. Shedecided
to try exercise and found Healthworks Community Fitness, a
nonprofit health and fitnesscenter, near her home in Dorchester.
The center charges membership on a sliding scale and was able
tohook up Cooper with a volunteer wellness coach.
That coach, Cooper says, changed her life.
Wellness coaching, individualized regular motivational sessions
geared to helping people achieve betterhealth and lifestyle goals,
is not just for executives anymore. Much the same way that personal
trainersmade their way from the elite celebrity studio to a staple
of the gym, wellness coaches are becomingincreasingly
accessible.
In a pilot program begun last fall at Harvard Vanguard in
Chelmsford and Medford, wellness coachHeidi Duskey provides
individual coaching to patients with weight and health problems at
no additionalcost. The idea behind the program, funded through a
three-year grant by Blue Cross Blue Shield, is thatit will
ultimately improve and lower the cost of patient care, Duskey
says.
Just last month, Medicare announced it would cover up to 20
sessions per year of intensive behavioralintervention for obese
patients. Although the current parameters are restrictive,
mandating that theservice must be provided within a primary care
doctors office, the wellness coaching industry sees thisas a
significant foot in the door, says Margaret Moore, co-director of
the Institute of Coaching atMcLean Hospital, and founder of
Wellcoaches in Wellesley, a health and wellness training
andcertification program for coaches.
Even though the Medicare decision currently specifies that the
sessions be provided by a doctor or nursepractitioner, Moore says
it is an invitation for everyone in the field - including wellness
coaches - to testnew protocols and submit data.
She points to a randomized controlled study, published in
November in the New England Journal ofMedicine, that showed
promising results when primary care doctors and wellness coaches
workedtogether to tackle obesity. That study compared face-to-face
coaching with both remote coaching (viatelephone or Web) and a
control group. The percentage of participants who lost more than 5
percent oftheir initial weight was 41.4 percent for those receiving
face-to-face coaching, 38.2 percent for remotecoaching, and 18.8
percent in the control group. Most significantly, the participants
who receivedcoaching had sustained the weight loss at two
years.
What exactly is a wellness coach? At Wellcoaches, Moores
certification program in Wellesley, traineesare expected to arrive
with a background in fitness, nutrition, physical health or mental
health and thecurriculum includes studies in behavioral science and
positive psychology.
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ou ready for wellness coaching? - The Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/health/articles/2012/01/02/are_y
7/10/2013
7/28/2019 Are You Ready for Wellness Coaching?
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But there are no set educational requirements in the industry
nationwide, and anyone, from a vitaminsalesman to an MD, can call
herself a wellness coach. An October article in the Archives of
InternalMedicine pointed out that because of this inconsistent and
ill-defined role, health coaching lacks arigorous evidence
base.
Moore says this is changing. She is on the leadership committee
of the National Consortium forCredentialing of Health &
Wellness Coaches, a group of more than 75 individuals and
organizations inhealth care, including government agencies and
academic medical institutions, that are working todevelop national
standards and competency testing.
On a recent visit with her client Tania Cooper, wellness coach
Ashley Norwood came armed with a stackof paperwork that detailed
the progress Cooper has made in the 18 months that they have been
workingtogether.
In that time, Cooper has lost 44 pounds. Shes gone from barely
being able to walk her children to thebus stop to walking 15-minute
miles on the treadmill. Her glycated hemoglobin and fasting
glucoselevels, both indicators of diabetes, declined to within a
normal range, and her blood pressure hasdropped.
Although an executive wellness coach may charge $200 to $300 per
hour, there is a growing army ofwellness coaches that charge
between $50 and $100 per hour, comparable to a personal trainer or
a
massage therapist. Norwood volunteers her services to
Healthworks free of charge as a means of givingback to the
community, and later this month, she will lead a group-wellness
class at Harvard Vanguardin Cambridge that will cost participants
$10 per session.
Wellness coaching begins with a questionnaire, Norwood explains,
in which clients are asked toprioritize what is important in their
lives, including physical, emotional, and spiritual health. The
clientcreates a wellness vision, along with as an honest assessment
of motivators, strengths, challenges, andweaknesses.
This is done together with me taking notes and prompting
questions, Norwood says. With thatinformation in hand, she helps
the client set various three-month goals that are broken down into
moremanageable weekly goals. Progress is supported by regular
check-ins, in person or by phone, that are
tailored to the clients needs.
In terms of fitness, a weekly goal might be going to the gym
just once during the week or trying a yogavideo. In terms of diet,
it might mean simply trying a new vegetable or reading a chapter in
a bookNorwood recommends to learn to eat mindfully.
Cooper says that initially she was interested only in losing
weight, but the more she talked about hergoals with Norwood the
more she realized what mattered most was being healthy enough to
raise herdaughters. I didnt want to have the serious issues of an
older person, and not be able to run up a hill.
Shifting the focus to health also made changing her diet easier.
Cooper says that she had more successwhen she thought in terms of
adding to her life, rather than depriving herself. She became
interested in
new, healthier ways to cook chicken and learned to experiment
with foods like rutabaga, butternutsquash, and tofu.
She also began taking her medication and using the mask the
doctor prescribed her for sleep apnea. Shestarted meditating every
day and went back to school, and became an apprentice at a funeral
home.
Coaching merely provides structure and accountability so that
clients can achieve their own goals, saysNorwood. Its not about me
telling them what to do. Most people know what they need to do;
they justcant get themselves to do it.
Jan Brogan can be reached at [email protected].
ou ready for wellness coaching? - The Boston Globe
http://www.boston.com/lifestyle/health/articles/2012/01/02/are_y
7/10/2013
