Media Coverage

Achievers, an industry-leading employee engagement platform provider, today announced the moderator and panelists of its Chief Human Resource Officer (CHRO) and Executive Leadership session, "The New Digital Workforce and the Future of Employee Engagement," taking place at its 2019 annual user conference, Achievers Customer Experience (ACE). The 2019 CHRO and Executive Leadership session will be moderated by former executive editor of Fast Company and editor and managing director of The Flux Group, Robert Safian. On stage, the esteemed panelists joining Safian will be:[CR-LF][CR-LF]Arielle Meloul-Wechsler, Senior Vice President, People, Culture and Communications, Air Canada[CR-LF]Cecilia McKenney, Senior Vice President, Chief Human Resources Officer, Quest Diagnostics[CR-LF]Michael Agrir, CEO and President, Medxcel[CR-LF]Vanessa Thurston, Interim Vice President & Head of Talent Management, Samsung Electronics America

As Americans marijuana usages continue to climb, workplaces are taking a more lenient approach to drug testing. The Rockefeller Institute of Government recently released a new study looking into marijuana usage, finding more and more Americans are toking up big-time in all 50 states, whether it’s illegal or legal. In states where weed legalization hasn’t been passed, marijuana usage has grown 33% since 2002.Workforce drug positivity reached a fourteen-year high in 2018, according to an analysis by Quest Diagnostics, which discovered nearly a 5% increase (4.4%) in urine drug tests since 2017. The study based its analysis of nearly 9 million workforce urine drug tests performed between January and December 2018.

Some employees are stressed to death at work — literally. But the right benefits can help save lives.[CR-LF][CR-LF]A report gathered by the American Heart Association, and a coalition of over 40 CEOs from large companies — called the AHA CEO Roundtable — illustrated how mental health impacts employees’ physical health, and their employer’s bottom line. The report, “Mental Health: A Workforce in Crisis,” found around 8,000 employees around the world die every year from medical conditions — like strokes and heart attacks — caused by high job demands.[CR-LF][CR-LF]“In order to have a healthy workforce, employers must look at health and wellness holistically – and that includes mental health,” says Steve Rusckowski, CEO of Quest Diagnostics.

Large employers may be excited about recent research which looked at National Health Interview Survey data and found a near-term decline in new cases of diabetes as well as a plateau in existing U.S. cases. While the news that new cases of diabetes may be declining does sound promising, benefit managers should resist the urge to break out the champagne.[CR-LF][CR-LF]Although, it’s understandable why they would want to celebrate. More than half of Americans under age 65 — roughly 158 million people — have health insurance through an employer, and chronic conditions like diabetes are major drivers in the year-over-year increases in employee health benefit costs.

As night approaches at Allegheny County Airport, after most of the air traffic has come and gone, the flight crews of Quest Diagnostics are just getting started.[CR-LF][CR-LF]More than 3,700 Quest ground couriers deliver a wide range of medical samples, including vials of blood and bone marrow, from doctors’ offices and Quest outpatient centers to the airport. Crews load the samples on cargo jets for overnight flights to Quest laboratories to be tested.

The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has recently issued draft guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of Lyme disease. This was written together with the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), and the American College of Rheumatology (ACR). [CR-LF][CR-LF]The Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) has recently issued draft guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of Lyme disease. This was written together with the American Academy of Neurology (AAN), and the American College of Rheumatology (ACR). They offer a public comment period until August 10, 2019.

A company offering to freeze donors’ T cells and save them until the day they are needed—perhaps even years before the onset of cancer or disease—is getting off the ground with $1 million in funding and partnerships with some of the largest operators in blood sample management and cold chain logistics.[CR-LF][CR-LF]As a kind of T-cell insurance, Cell Vault is pitching a simple concept: Today’s cutting-edge chimeric antigen receptor T-cell (CAR-T) therapies require a starting point of donated T cells, which are genetically modified to better recognize, target and destroy tumor cells before being readministered to the patient. Elsewhere, mobile blood draw and sample collections will be completed by ExamOne, a Quest Diagnostics company. Cell Vault is also gathering medical advice from CAR-T specialists at the Medical College of Wisconsin

An employee has a beer or two with colleagues at a local bar after the work shift is over. Another heads home for a glass of wine with dinner. The next day, there is no alcohol impairment in the worker, and that’s why an employer would not have a problem with either of these scenarios. But even in states where cannabis has been legalized, drug testing continues to search for signs of marijuana use that in no way necessarily reflects worker impairment.The number of positives for drugs in the workforce has reached a 14-year high of 4.4%, according to an annual analysis conducted by Quest Diagnostics, one of the nation’s largest clinical laboratory testing companies. The rates of drug use are now more than 25% higher than the 30-year low of 3.5 percent recorded between 2010 and 2012.

Make sure the lab is in-network[CR-LF]If your insurance only covers lab work done at, say, Quest Diagnostics, but your doctor usually sends their samples to a different lab, you can end up footing the bill. Before getting your test done, double-check which labs will be covered by your insurance and be sure to notify your doctor; it’s just one question you should be asking your doctor but probably aren’t.