LOS ANGELES, California – June 29, 2016
When you hear the word “wellness,” what do you think? You may think about spas, yoga, massages, smoking cessation programs, preventive health programs or physician referral programs. You likely don’t think of technology. However, technology is a part of wellness. Wearable fitness devices, virtual physician visits, and mobile nutrition and workout apps are all part of wellness. In the future, the health club industry will use as-yet unknown wellness-related technology.
That’s why I’m excited that Club Industry is the official media sponsor for the third annual Motionsoft Technology Summit, a forum for IT decision makers in the fitness industry to be held Sept. 13-15 in Baltimore. (Registration is limited, so if you want to attend, sign up ASAP.) As part of the Technology Summit, I will be moderating a wellness leadership panel that will focus on how technology will help in the wellness effort. The panelists will be Julia Huggins, president-Mid-Atlantic, Cigna Healthcare; Jeff Skeen, CEO, Fitness Connection; Dr. Vaishali Geib, co-founder of Internal Medicine Consultants and co-president of Shenandoah Independent Practice Association; Clark Lagemann, co-founder and managing partner, MedPro Wellness; and Houman Arasteh, president, h2 fit. The panel will cover how technology is being used in wellness from the perspectives of a health care service provider, club owner, physician, wellness program provider and technology provider.
Prior to that event, you can get a preview of the topic in a webinar “The Technology and Tips You Need to Get into the Wellness Market,” presented by Lagemann as part of a series of webinars put on by Motionsoft. The webinar is at 2 p.m. Eastern on July 12. Registration is limited to 100 people, so make sure to sign up for this right away.
All of this leads up to the wellness track at the Club Industry Show, Oct. 12-14 at the Hyatt Regency Chicago. On Oct. 12, we have six wellness sessions planned around topics such as “The Changing Healthcare Landscape and the Wellness Opportunity,” “Integrating Fitness into the Executive Healthcare Continuum: A Chief Medical Officer’s Perspective,” “How to Take Advantage of Insurance Reimbursement for Preventive Care That Is Driven by Healthcare Reform,” “Population Health and the Value-Based Landscape of Healthcare,” “Opportunities to Improve the Fitness-Wellness-Medical Continuum and Differentiate Your Club in the Community.” And the last session of the day will be a panel of all the wellness speakers, moderated by the wellness track chair, Dr. Kevin Steele, principal with Communications Consultants.
Although none of these presentations are specifically on technology, the fact is that technology has become such a big part of our health and wellness industry that technology will be a part of several of these presentations.
So now you have three opportunities to increase your education on wellness and technology. I urge you to take advantage of these.