HealthMedia and Aetna to Study Online Insomnia and Depression Int...( Controlled Trial Condu...),Health

Controlled Trial Conducted with Pilot Programs

ANN ARBOR, Mich., June 19 /PRNewswire/ -- HealthMedia, Inc., the global leader in scalable behavior change interventions with outcomes, announced a new research study with Aetna which will provide HealthMedia's Overcoming(TM) Insomnia and Overcoming(TM) Depression online behavior change interventions to at least 400,000 eligible employees of Aetna's large employer members. Together, HealthMedia and Aetna will conduct a controlled trial to study the effectiveness of the online interventions in improving workplace productivity and reducing healthcare costs. This study will be part of a larger Aetna initiative focusing on driving behavior change across all conditions.

"We recognize that depression and insomnia are both problems that are major drivers of healthcare costs, employee productivity and the overall health and happiness of our members," said Michael Golinkoff, PhD, Aetna National Clinical Director. "We are very optimistic that these two HealthMedia programs can add tremendous value and augment the current treatment offerings for our members."

In fact research has shown that:

-- Depression is associated with 27.2 annual lost workdays per worker

-- Workers with depression reported significantly more total

health-related lost productive time than those without depression

(5.6 hrs/week vs. 1.5 hrs/week)

-- Those with severe insomnia miss work twice as often as good sleepers

-- The annual cost for absenteeism per worker with insomnia is $4,800

Aetna plans to utilize an integrated database to identify participants for the two programs. For the insomnia program, Aetna will identify members who are chronic users of prescription sleep medications. For the depression program, participants will include members who are not responding well to their current treatment programs.

With implementation set to begin in the second
'/>"/>