YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
YOUR BUSINESS AUTHORITY
Springfield, MO
They say an apple a day keeps the doctor away. At Digital Monitoring Products Inc., they’re saying an on-site clinic keeps employees healthy and health care costs low.
In a partnership with veteran Dr. Jim Blaine, DMP opened a medical clinic at the security systems manufacturer’s headquarters to promote staff wellness and sickness prevention.
“In today’s medical world, we hear stories of employees who have to wait months to see a physician,” said Chris Stange, DMP’s chief financial officer who worked on developing the clinic. “This is a way to give almost immediate access on-site.”
All 315 full-time DMP employees and their family members can visit the clinic by appointment during morning hours on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Clinic staff members provide prevention services, acute care and minor surgeries.
No. 4 for Blaine
The DMP clinic is the fourth on-site clinic Blaine has started in Springfield.
In 2003, he helped create the clinic at Paul Mueller Co., and a few years later, brought a clinic to City Utilities with Tulsa, Oklahoma-based CareATC. In 2007, he independently started the on-site clinic at Ozarks Technical Community College for full-time employees and dependents.
“I think that (on-site care) is important because our American health system really doesn’t put as much emphasis on prevention as others do,” said Blaine, who stopped working at the OTC clinic this month. “This puts us at a disadvantage with return on investment for health care. The on-site clinics give a better access to primary care than what is available in communities.”
Blaine said the idea to start the DMP clinic had been tossed around for years with the privately held company’s owner, Rick Britton. Last year, the team finally took action.
“I think it was meant to be,” said Blaine, who has been Britton’s personal physician for years. “I just retired at OTC after 10 years, and so I think the stars just aligned.”
At DMP, employees are able to make an appointment and visit the clinic during the workday. If staff members are out sick and coming from home, there is a separate entrance for discrete access. All employees must work with DMP for at least 60 days before gaining access to the clinic.
Objective: wellness
The clinic space was carved out of a total 72,000-square-foot addition in a $7 million expansion last year at DMP’s headquarters, 2500 N. Partnership Blvd. in Partnership Industrial Center. The clinic includes two exam rooms, a waiting room and an office space.
DMP officials say employee wellness is the main goal. With this preventive approach to individual health, they suspect it will reduce the need of health care accessed from other providers.
“The wellness thing here is a part of our fabric and is engrained in us,” Stange said.
DMP encourages healthy living for its employees by holding contests for the number of steps taken, hosting lunches with healthy food options and providing a space where employees can exercise with workout equipment and a quarter-mile indoor track. Employees are encouraged to use the workout space before and after work, as well as during lunch breaks.
On-site savings
Chief Operations Officer Marc Mills said the clinic is completely funded by DMP, and employees can use the clinic regardless of their insurance coverage.
DMP officials declined to disclose the cost of opening the clinic, which included a renovation to create a doctor’s office as well as hiring Blaine and his staff.
Blaine said he is the only clinic physician and his team includes a medical assistant, a nurse, an office manager and another physician who covers his workload as needed. In the agreement, Blaine covers all of the medical equipment costs.
Other Springfield employers have tapped into the growing trend of on-site employee clinics as a means to combat volatile and rising health care costs.
One example is the OTC Health and Wellness Clinic that opened in 2007. With Blaine’s efforts on the campus, OTC’s health care costs dropped in the clinic’s first year and remained flat in the four years following.
Since 2012, OTC Director of Communications and Marketing Mark Miller said the college’s insurance costs have increased by about 5 percent each year to a current $3.4 million annually.
“If it didn’t pay for itself, we probably wouldn’t continue to do it,” Miller said. “We recognize that those are smaller increases than other similar-sized employers that have increased by 7 or 8 percent each year. A lot of factors contribute to that.”
Those factors include a switch in insurance providers in 2012. OTC officials also have said access to the clinic helped lower the college’s insurance coverage costs for all full-time employees and their families.
“Dr. Blaine’s practice saved the college money,” Miller said.
“He contributed to a culture of preventive care.”
Missouri State University’s science building, built in 1971 and formerly called Temple Hall, is being reconstructed and updated.
