Quest Diagnostics - Wellness Program Administrator

LSS Wellness Program

The LSS Wellness Program is a very important piece of how LSS invests in our staff. Without our staff, we could not deliver on our company mission of “older adults living life to the fullest” and we want you to live your fullest life too. An important part of your living life to the fullest is your health and wellbeing, and this program is designed around providing you the support as well as opportunities to better manage your health and wellbeing.

LSS is recognized year after year by outside organizations such as Healthiest Employers and the American Heart Association for the efforts and financial investments we place in this program.  In fact, LSS ranked #1 in all of St. Louis for similar-sized employers (1,500-4,999 employees) in 2022. Our program, which evolves year after year, has demonstrated success in helping our workforce become healthier each year they are part of the LSS family.  For that we are very proud, and it wouldn’t be possible without the support and focus of everyone across LSS. 2024 is the 16th year for the LSS Wellness Program and we partner with Quest Diagnostics to administer the program. (Quest Diagnostics, one of the best companies in the employee health industry, is compliant with HIPAA regulations and therefore does not share individual or family members’ health information with LSS.)

How Our Wellness Program Works

The LSS Wellness Program is available to all active LSS staff, as well as spouses covered on our medical plans.

To register in the Quest portal, follow these instructions:

• Visit My.QuestForHealth.com

• In the Create Account area (green box), enter your Registration Key: lutheranseniorservices2023

• Click the Register Now button

• When prompted, enter your Unique ID: Employee ID (Spouses’ Unique ID will be the Employee ID with an “S” added to the end, e.g. 123456S)

• Complete the screens that follow to finish the registration process

• Once you’ve registered, you’ll arrive at the dashboard

• Under Wellness Screening, select an option to schedule your screening.

All employees are invited to complete an annual biometric screening, but those employees enrolled in one of our LSS Medical Plans must screen to earn a “Wellness Credit”, which significantly lowers your insurance premiums.  If an employee covers a spouse on their medical plan, the spouse must also complete an annual biometric screening to receive discounted premiums. (Dependent children are not eligible participate in the wellness program.)

In order to learn how you can earn discounts on your medical insurance premiums (i.e. wellness credits), please review the flyers to the right named “It’s Easy to Save Money by Knowing Your Health” and “Wellness Screening for First Time Employees”, and/or review the section below titled “Earning the Wellness Credit.

Earning the Wellness Credit

In order to earn a wellness credit, which translates into significant discounts on your medical insurance premiums, a biometric screening must be completed. The monthly discounts that you earn by completing this process can be seen in the chart to the right.

Biometric screenings can be completed in 3 different ways:

1. Off-site at a participating Quest Lab year-round (except in the month of June). You may fulfill the screening requirement by visiting a participating Quest Lab (or Diagnostics® Patient Service Center). Log in to the Quest platform, in the Wellness Screening section, under Patient Service Center, select Schedule a Screening. The venipuncture method will be used to measure the blood work.

2. An At-Home Screening Kit allows you to self-administer a biometric wellness screening in the comfort of your own home. Log in to the Quest platform, in the Wellness Screening section, under Self-Collection, select Order Materials. The materials are mailed to your home, shipped within 3-5 business days, and include everything you need to perform the screening yourself. You will be given an instructional brochure on how to collect a dried blood sample using the lancet finger stick device provided. When complete, you will mail the screening sample back to Quest Diagnostics in a self-addressed, prepaid envelope. Quest Diagnostics processes the sample and will send email notifications to alert you when your results are ready to be viewed online. Your printed report will arrive in the mail 2-3 weeks after Quest processes your self-collection materials.

3. You may also satisfy this requirement by submitting relevant lab work from your own physician if that’s what you prefer. (Certain restrictions apply to this option and you may also incur out-of-pocket costs that you are responsible for.) If a member prefers to obtain lab results from their own physician, they should request their physician to collect labs for Glucose using the Hemoglobin A1C method, triglycerides, HDL Cholesterol, LDL Cholesterol, and blood pressure, and have their physician document these lab results on the “Physician Results Form”, available in the Quest online portal. You will select the Physician Results Form option as part of the screening scheduling process. A Physician Results Form, pre-populated with all your demographic information, will be made available for you to print. The member and their physician must complete and sign the “Physician Results Form”, and then you may fax the completed form to the fax number indicated on the form or you may submit your completed form to Quest electronically using the Upload Form button on the dashboard.

These screenings provide vital information about your overall health, including cholesterol (total, LDL, and HDL), triglycerides, cardiac risk, glucose (Hemoglobin A1C), blood pressure, height, weight, Body Mass Index (BMI), and waist measurement.  Biometric screenings must be scheduled online through the Quest portal and fasting for 8 hours is required.

Once you complete your screening, you’ll see your results for each biometric measure in your Quest portal and whether you met your health metric goal.  If you met your health metric goal, you’ll see a green checkmark for that metric. 

If your screening results for 3 or more of the metrics meet the health metric standards or goals (according to the chart below, and noted in the portal with a green checkmark), you’ll earn the wellness credit/discount. 

Health Assessment Outcomes

Triglycerides: Less than 150 mg/dLLDL

LDL Cholesterol: Less than 130 mg/dL

HDL Cholesterol: 

Male: Greater than or equal to 40mg/dL     

Female: Greater than or equal to 50mg/dL

Blood Pressure:

Systolic: Less than 130 mmHg

Diastolic: Less than 85 mmHg

Glucose (Hemoglobin A1c) (w/ Fasting): Between 4.0% – 5.6% of total Hgb

If your screening results do not earn you at least 3 green checkmarks because some of them are “out of range”, these are opportunities to engage with a healthcare practitioner to earn the green checkmark(s)… You have two options to complete this follow up step and earn the green checkmark(s)

Option 1: If you prefer to visit your own primary care physician to earn the 5 green checkmark(s), you’ll utilize the Quest “Physician Engagement Form”.  (Please note: Approvals of the form may take up to 10 business days, and wellness credits will not be awarded until 3 or more green checkmarks are obtained and that information is transmitted to LSS.)

Option 2: If you prefer to consult with a 98point6 healthcare professional to earn the green checkmark(s), you can use 98point6 for a free virtual, one-on-one health consultation with a Nurse Practitioner. This is a convenient way to earn the wellness discount. After completing a biometric screening with Quest Diagnostics, you will receive an email to register for a 98point6 on-demand primary care visit. During a convenient time of your choice, an email and text message will be sent with a link to 98point6’s secure online system. The secure system will open in your browser, prompting you to answer a few questions about your medical history. After answering the questions, a healthcare professional will appear on the device, and you will spend the next 10 minutes discussing test results and creating a Personal Action Plan.  If you do not want to wait for an email, once you receive the notification that your Quest results are available, you can download the 98point6 app and start the on-demand virtual visit process.

Participating in the LSS wellness screening process is valuable.  Not only does it mean you’re on the road to improved health, it means you’re saving a lot of money on your employee premiums.  When you first become benefits eligible at LSS and enroll in a medical plan, your payroll premiums will automatically include the full wellness credit discount for both you (and your spouse, if applicable).  However, based upon the date when your medical coverage begin date, you will need to complete your Biometric Screening, and any necessary follow-up steps, within 6 months in order to ensure these same wellness credits continue beyond that 6-month point without any interruption.  If you don’t complete the required actions to continue your wellness credit by the 6-month deadline, don’t worry – it’s not too late.  Once you eventually complete the required actions after that date, and LSS receives confirmation from Quest that you have, you can begin to earn wellness discounts for the remainder of that time frame going forward.

So why does LSS provide these wellness credits? To reward our employees and covered spouses for managing their health.  When you proactively manage your health, not only does it help you live your life to the fullest, it also helps contain healthcare costs for all of us on the LSS medical plans.  And all of us hear all the time on the news how costly healthcare costs in the United States continue to increase year after year.  All of us managing our health is a win/win for everyone – better personal health AND better healthcare costs for our LSS team members and their families.

Please contact your Human Resources representative if you have any questions.

Physical health is just one aspect of overall wellness. Click here to learn about the resources our EAP program offers to support you in social, mental, financial, spiritual, and other areas of overall wellbeing.

LSS team members (FT and PT) qualify for discounted rates via payroll deduction for Club Fitness gym memberships! Click on the picture below to visit our LSS Perkspot portal for more information and to sign-up.