ELCA Bishops Told of Urgent Need for Health, Wellness of Leaders

CHICAGO (ELCA) -- Citing statistics gleaned from health
analysis reports, the president of the Evangelical Lutheran
Church in America (ELCA) Board of Pensions said the church may
not be able to grow unless its professional leaders embrace a
stronger health and wellness discipline.
John G. Kapanke made the comment Oct. 9 in a report to the
ELCA Conference of Bishops that he said would be "a courageous
conversation" because of its urgency. The ELCA Conference of
Bishops is an advisory body of the church, consisting of the
ELCA's 65 synod bishops, presiding bishop and secretary. It met
here Oct. 5-10.
Kapanke told the conference that the Board estimates "a
fairly low percentage" of the church's professional leaders
actually live healthy lives. "We must change our ways to keep
this church viable," he said.
For the past three years the Board, working with the Mayo
Clinic, Rochester, Minn., has offered an online health risk
assessment and encouraged church leaders -- most of whom are
clergy -- to participate. The assessment asked participants a
series of questions about their overall health and suggested ways
they can maintain good health. Participants are given an
individualized assessment of various risk factors, Kapanke said.
This year's assessment was conducted in January and February.
Data from the 2006 assessment shows some areas of concern,
Kapanke said. For example, professional leaders have an average
of 4.3 risk factors, he said. The data show that about 1.8 of
the risk factors are related to "medical risk" or inherited
conditions that a person cannot control.
About 2.5 factors are lifestyle risks, Kapanke reported,
citing lack of exercise, poor eating habits, some smoking and
some excessive alcohol consumption.
"That's high. All of the statistics I related to the
bishops are above average, and some are significantly above
average," he told the ELCA News Service in an interview.
In addition Kapanke said, in the 2006 data about 71 percent
of the participants have risk factors because of poor nutrition;
69 percent are overweight; 64 percent are at risk for the
consequences of high blood pressure; 63 percent indicate that
they have poor emotional health; 35 percent are at risk for the
consequences of lack of physical exercise; and 13 percent
indicate they take medication for depression.
About 2,500 people took the online health risk assessment in
2006, Kapanke said. Participant numbers have declined from the
first year the assessment was offered when about 4,500 people
participated, he said.
To get a better picture of the total membership of the ELCA
health plan administered by the Board, Kapanke said the Board
asked Watson Wyatt, a global consulting firm based in Washington,
D.C., to do an analysis. Kapanke said the firm's findings were
"startling."
The findings showed that 7 percent of the health plan's
"covered lives" had claims of more than $10,000 annually,
amounting to 56 percent of total medical and pharmacy claims.
"So, 7 percent of our (clients) are driving 56 percent of our
claims costs. Both of those numbers are higher than the
average," Kapanke said.
"It gets worse," Kapanke said. Participants in the health
plan have much higher incidence of "catastrophic claims," which
are claims of $25,000 or more, when compared to participants in a
national database in which the ELCA participates. That database
-- the National Data Cooperative -- includes health plan
participants from the ELCA, the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod
and about 37 other corporations, he said.
"Our catastrophic claims, as compared to others in that
group, were three times higher," Kapanke said.
Trends in health for ELCA professional leaders are
"deteriorating," Kapanke said, which is why the Board asked for
the Watson Wyatt analysis.

Health care costs may affect the church's mission
Kapanke urged the bishops to revisit the Board's whole
health and wellness concept and emphasized the importance of its
"Wholeness Wheel." The Wholeness Wheel emphasizes a balanced
lifestyle for good health and includes emotional, physical,
vocational, intellectual and social/interpersonal well-being.
"I wanted to cite some of this data and underscore the
importance of needed lifestyle changes, because we're not making
improvements," he said in the interview. "In fact we're going
the other way."
Kapanke quoted from a recent ELCA new release about mission
starts. The release reported that the ELCA places a priority on
starting new congregations. He compared that to the poor health
statistics of the church's professional leaders.
"We firmly believe that healthy leaders enhance lives, and
if we don't have healthy leaders ... we're not going to have
effective leaders, and we won't be able to grow this church. I
wanted to drive home that message -- that there is a correlation
between healthy leaders and having a viable church," Kapanke
said.
Health care costs affect the church's mission financially,
he said. In recent years, mission support -- funds shared with
synods and the ELCA churchwide organization by congregations --
has declined slightly. Health care costs will take more and more
mission dollars, he said.
In 2005, Kapanke said, mission support was about 9 percent
of total income, and health costs were about 4 percent. If
current trends remain, in 2013 the numbers will flip, he said,
with about 8 percent of total income to go for health care costs,
leaving about 5 percent for mission support.

Kapanke seeks bishops' help to change health trends
There isn't much the church can do about rising health care
costs in general, but it can focus attention on the underlying
factors that affect health trends and try to make improvements,
the Board president said.
Specifically, Kapanke asked the bishops to use the Board's
wholeness wheel for maintaining good health and consider making
it a focus in synods. He suggested health and wellness as the
theme of a synod assembly, which could include serving healthier
foods and snacks, and regular breaks for physical activity.
Kapanke also suggested the bishops call on Tammy L. Devine, the
Board's wellness coordinator, and build on the wellness theme
using the ELCA social statement, "Caring for Health: Our Shared
Endeavor," adopted at the 2003 ELCA Churchwide Assembly.
"If bishops take the leadership role here and (serve as)
good models and talk about it, slowly we can maybe begin to
change attitudes and have people embrace the overall health and
wellness much stronger than they have in the past. That was
really my challenge to the bishops," he said.
Kapanke asked the bishops to encourage more professional
leaders to take the annual health risk assessment in 2007.
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Hear some of John Kapanke's comments on the Web at:
http://media.ELCA.org/audionews/061017A.mp3
http://media.ELCA.org/audionews/061017B.mp3

Information about the ELCA Board of Pensions is at
http://www.ELCAbop.org on the Web.

Information about the "Wholeness Wheel" is at
http://tinyurl.com/tg7pj on the Web.

For information contact:
John Brooks, Director (773) 380-2958 or news@elca.org
http://www.elca.org/news
ELCA News Blog: http://www.elca.org/news/blog