Dr L Dorian Dugmore
President and Founder, Wellness International Ltd.

Adidas U.K. and Dr. Dorian Dugmore joined forces (1997-2009) to pioneer a new concept in Preventative Medicine and Wellness at the adidas U.K. headquarters in Hazel Grove, Stockport, England.   The ‘adifit for LIFE’ programme has received World and European Best Practice Awards for Corporate Wellness. He has now formed a new company entitled The Wellness Academy, delivering consulting services in wellness to the corporate world.

Dr. Dugmore has been working in Cardiovascular Medicine and Wellness for 30 years and has written extensively on health, exercise and heart disease.  He has worked with several companies in the United Kingdom including Schwarz Pharma, an international pharmaceutical company, adidas, the sporting goods company and Allied Dunbar, formerly one of Britain’s largest insurance companies, who were co-sponsors of the first National Fitness Survey.  His background includes over 17 years experience working within education, teaching at primary, secondary and university levels.  His doctoral research conducted within the U.K. specialised in cardiovascular medicine and focused on the rehabilitation of post heart attack patients and was published in the prestigious journal “Heart” (April, 1999).

In 1973, Dr. Dugmore pioneered a cardiac rehabilitation scheme within the Dudley Health Authority, England.  This led to the formulation of Action Heart, a national charity.  He served for a number of years on the National Coronary Prevention Group panel for cardiac rehabilitation in the U.K. and was a prime mover in the formulation of both the British and European Associations of Cardiovascular Rehabilitation.  In addition he was the Vice-President of the international organisation ‘Heart Friends Around the World’.

In 1992, Dorian moved to Toronto, Canada, to become the programme director of one of the world’s leading centres in cardiac rehabilitation. He was subsequently invited to join the National Canadian Cholesterol Council as their specialist in “Exercise Medicine”.    During the following four years Dr. Dugmore was appointed as Co-Chair of the International Committee for the AACVPR (American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation).  This group were pioneers in forming the first multi disciplinary World Council for Cardio Pulmonary Rehabilitation and Dr Dugmore subsequently became its Secretary General.

Dorian is one of the first British citizens to be awarded a fellowship to the AACVPR for his outstanding work in cardiovascular medicine. At the beginning of 1999, he was invited to join the Medical/Scientific Advisory Council for the IHRSA Institute on Exercise and Health.   In March 2000 the adidas Wellness Centre under Dorian’s leadership received the IHRSA ‘Wellness Best Practice’ Award for Europe.  In (2005) the work of Wellness International was  recognised at the Sunday Times 100 Best Companies Awards and resulted in adidas receiving the 5 Star Heath and Safety Award from the British Safety Council.  In 2009 adidas received the prestigious “Sword of Honour” a global award for its outstanding work in health and safety.  Dorian is a board member of the European Society of Cardiology’s working groups on Cardiac Rehabilitation, Exercise Physiology, Sport Cardiology and it’s committee for Prevention and Implementation.

Dr. Dugmore has earned numerous awards for his work, including an MEB “Heart of Britain Award”, recognising his contribution towards improving quality of life within the community.  He has been featured on British Television a number of times including a documentary on the “Tonight with Trevor McDonald” Programme, focusing on stress, heart disease and football league management and the BBC’s “Working Lunch” anchored by Adrian Chiles, focussing on the health of Chief Executives.  As a sportsman he has achieved similar success, playing and coaching soccer at the highest level which included four consecutive international appointments as Great Britain’s Coach to the “World Student Games” soccer team. 

During 2005 he completed his 20th marathon in London chaperoning the then British Minister of Sport, Richard Caborn and in 2009 completed his 23rd marathon in Dublin, Ireland.

He is an active member of “Vistage International”, (the largest world organisation for chief executives) and is also a board member of the World Economic Forum for Corporate Wellness.  Dorian has completed unique research on senior high profile executives in Canada and the UK significantly reducing their cardiovascular and lifestyle risk.  He is currently leading a unique research project on the cardiovascular health of the U.K’s football league managers and helped pioneer the first U.K. University Master of Science Degree in Wellness and Preventative Medicine.  Dorian’s dream is to see specialist centres for disease prevention and corporate wellness around the world.

2012 - Corporate Wellness: A Concept Who's Time Has Come

“Looking after your people has never been more important than in todays tough and demanding results orientated climate”. The “corporate athlete” is rapidly emerging as the individual who can stay the distance and constantly perform to a high level in a business sense, over a number of years. Corporate performance is therefore “an endurance event and not a sprint”. Consequently good health and wellbeing are essential to support the the long term demands of a 30 to 40 year professional career in the corporate setting.

There is a growing field of evidence that reinforces the benefits of improving employee wellbeing and its positive impact on the bottom line. Several government reports have highlighted the cost saving benefits of corporate wellness programmes on reducing absenteeism, retaining key staff and improving company morale. The 2009 Boorman Report identified the cost of absenteeism through sickness to the National Health Service at 10.3 million lost working days annually at a cost of 1.7 billion. Reducing these figures by one third would result in an annual direct cost saving of £555 million. In contrast corporate adidas, the international sport brand, reduced their average annual absenteeism rates from nearly 7 days per individual to less than 3 days, which coincided with the growth of corporate wellness programmes within the company.

International research on corporate wellness from companies like Johnson & Johnson, Unilever, and many others have demonstrated that successful corporate wellness programmes result in approximately a £5 saving for every £1 invested in corporate wellness. The Black report in 2009 highlighted the value of wellness interventions in the workplace together with a previous government white paper on “Healthy Lives, Healthy People”, the latter emphasising the need for “individual responsibility and behaviour change management for those wishing to make lifestyle changes that improve health.

Football shows the way
In recent years, Everton F.C. have paved the way for corporate wellness initiatives in football clubs by testing the key cardiovascular risk and lifestyle numbers in all their staff throughout the club. It makes perfect sense to know your wellness numbers alongside your clubs performance numbers to optimize the potential for success. Equally the League managers Association have developed their successful “Fit To Manage” programme focusing on the cardiovascular health and lifestyles of the football league managers. From the first 54 managers initially tested over 40% had key risk factors they needed to address. This programme has subsequently been very successful where many key health issues have been dealt with before they could have become more serious, even life threatening in some instances.

Corporate Organizations must “Lead from the Top”
This illustrates a key message, corporate wellness has to be led from the top and the CEO of a company must be “engaged” for wellness programmes to succeed. This was powerfully illustrated by our “Project Life Study on CE0’s conducted in Toronto, Canada during the 90’s where 70 top leaders underwent a cardiovascular and lifestyle risk management programme. Over 2 years, heart disease risk was reduced by 30-40% and nearly 60% of the CEO’s on the programme started some form of wellness initiative in their companies.

In addition it is also important to survey companies in terms of their current lifestyle behaviours before embarking upon a corporate wellness programme. This approach is called the “Precede Proceed Model” and reflects the need to engage everyone in the corporate setting, find out their needs and assess their readiness to change, before embarking upon a wellness programme.

The ever increasing need for companies to engage in improved “corporate and social responsibility” is paving the way to move “upstream” and prevent potential ill health through corporate wellness programmes. Compare this with the traditional model of “down stream medicine” where we wait for people to show signs and symptoms of illness and disease before intervening.

There are several companies that are leading the way through vigorously engaging in corporate wellness programmes, adidas the world renown sport brand, Unilever the League Managers Association and Causeway a company specializing in software for the built environment, are key leaders in this field, truly reflecting that “Corporate Wellness is a concept who’s time has come.

5 Top Tips For Corporate Wellness

• Engage the CEO of a company to lead wellness initiatives from the top
• Create a Corporate Wellness Plan to go alongside the business plan
• Use the “Precede Proceed model” to find out what the company needs before embarking on a corporate wellness programme
• Give quick feedback to everyone in the company when any corporate wellness intervention has been delivered
• Instil within the company “knowing your wellness numbers alongside your business performance numbers”