About CDC's LEAN Works!

CDC's LEAN Works! was developed in direct response to organizations asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for help in addressing the obesity epidemic-specifically, they wanted to know "What works?" CDC's response, grounded in science, identified interventions that work to prevent and control obesity. Also, because organizations do not usually publish information about their worksite programs in the scientific literature, CDC visited selected businesses to identify promising worksite obesity prevention and control practices.

CDC's LEAN Works! is a synthesis of the science and practice-based evidence to guide you in planning, building, promoting, and assessing a worksite obesity prevention and control program. Using evidence-based research from Community Guide Recommendations and promising practices, the CDC's Division of Nutrition Physical Activity and Obesity developed CDC's LEAN Works! to help employers respond to the current obesity epidemic.  The web site will help guide them in planning, building, promoting, and assessing an obesity prevention and control program.

CDC's LEAN Works! was developed through a number of processes:

• A systematic literature review on worksite health promotion programs, which include:
  • The Guide to Community Preventive Services (Community Guide)* worksite recommendation and a complementary promising practices review to identify worksite interventions addressing environmental and policy, informational and educational, and behavioral strategies. 
• Formative research conducted through employer-based expert panel meetings
  • Conducted  June 8, 2006 and June 7, 2007 
  • Leading worksite wellness representatives from 15 companies that range in size. 
  • Expert panels capture lessons from a range of methodologies and worksite experiences. 
• Focus groups with human resources personnel, worksite wellness directors, and human resources managers.
• Focus groups were composed of 64 benefits managers and human resources directors from small (50–499 employees) and mid-sized (500–4,999 employees) companies with worksite wellness programs around the country. Participants' companies comprised a range of sizes and industries, and participants themselves reflected a range of job tenures and levels of education.  Participants were stratified by their organizations' level of involvement in worksite wellness programming (low or moderate).

---

* Links to non-Federal organizations found at this site are provided solely as a service to our users. These links do not constitute an endorsement of these organizations or their programs by CDC or the Federal Government, and none should be inferred. CDC is not responsible for the content of the individual organization Web pages found at these links.