Warren Shepell has had a front-row seat for the evolution of how mental health has been treated in the workplace. Shepell was the pioneer and founder of employee assistance programs in Canada. He launched his first one in 1979 while working as an organizational consultant, after human resources professionals started referring employees struggling with mental-health […]
During a panel discussion at Benefits Canada’s 2024 Vancouver Benefits Summit in May, three experts discussed the role of virtual management platforms in helping Canadians with diabetes manage their condition. According to Diabetes Canada, roughly 12 million Canadians live with type 1, type 2 or prediabetes. Roughly a quarter of Canadians don’t have access to […]
While disability management poses many challenges to plan sponsors, rehabilitation consultants can address many of these hurdles, said Francis Marois, manager of the rehabilitation team at iA Financial Group, during a session at Benefits Canada’s 2024 Vancouver Benefits Summit in May. Plan sponsors often don’t communicate with an employee on leave to ensure they […]
With millennials and generation Z employees representing roughly 75 per cent of the Canadian workforce, employers need to respond to the changing needs of these demographics, said Andrew Brandsma, director of sales for new business development at claims processing company National HealthClaim, during a session at Benefits Canada’s 2024 Vancouver Benefits Summit in May. Both […]
During Canada’s unprecedented 2023 wildfire season, 6,500 individual fires burned more than 18.4 million hectares of land — and wildland firefighters bore the brunt of it all. “The working conditions are extremely dangerous and they’re getting more dangerous as fires become larger and more intense, and, in many cases, are going through communities,” says Bert […]
Amid a wave of frank and open discussions about women’s health, more plan sponsors are beginning to review their benefits and human resources policies with an eye to providing better support. It’s something that a group of health-care experts, speaking during a panel discussion at Benefits Canada’s 2024 Chronic Disease at Work conference in February, […]
After her husband Mike Kessler was diagnosed with mild Alzheimer’s disease in 2021, Karen Kessler admitted she would hover around him. The Windsor, Ont. couple implemented many strategies in place to manage Mike’s diagnosis, and Karen remembers believing he would need plenty of help. “I was doing everything, I was carrying the load, and quite […]
Employees with pulmonary arterial hypertension can experience significant impacts to their quality of life and workplace experience, said John Granton, a respirologist with the University Health Network in Toronto, during a session at Benefits Canada’s 2024 Chronic Disease at Work conference in February. Pulmonary arterial hypertension is a very rare condition, affecting less than 10,000 Canadians. It’s […]
With the increased availability of treatments for inflammatory bowel disease, patients can achieve longer periods of remission, said Vipul Jairath, a gastroenterologist at the London Health Sciences Centre and professor of medicine at Western University, during Benefits Canada’s 2024 Chronic Disease at Work conference in February. IBD involves an underlying pathological process that creates inflammation […]
After the simultaneous sell-off of both equities and bonds in the first half of 2022, many defined benefit pension plan sponsors were forced to “pay much more attention to the liquidity profiles of their portfolios” and manage risk by implementing a temporary policy reprieve, halting new investment activity or selling assets in the secondary market, […]