St. Joseph Hoag Health has laid another building block for the integrated regional care delivery it is establishing in Orange County.
The Irvine-based healthcare system opened a St. Joseph Hoag Wellness Corner at the Jamboree Center office complex on Jamboree Road near the San Diego (405) Freeway. The facility comes in partnership with Newport Beach-based developer Irvine Company, owner of the six-building office-and-hotel complex.
The health center will be available to serve roughly 200 businesses that account for approximately 4,000 employees at the complex, along with guests of the Hotel Irvine. Services include physical examinations; treatment of minor illnesses; telehealth, where doctors and patients connect through technology; travel medicine; and aesthetic treatments, such as Botox injections.
The center also has “lifestyle management” and health programs, such as stress management, yoga classes, sleep improvement, meditation, nutrition coaching, menu planning and personalized food plans.
The Jamboree Wellness Corner is the second on-site center to open under a partnership between St. Joseph Hoag Health and the Irvine Co. The first was the St. Joseph Hoag Health Wellness Corner, which started in September to serve Irvine Co.’s Village and Park luxury apartment complexes.
Marisa Hanke, chief marketing officer and senior vice president of strategic services for the developer’s Irvine Company Apartment Communities unit, said at the time that more centers would be considered.
“We are very disciplined around research and evaluating metrics around any new initiative, and I think we know going into it there won’t be a one-size-fits-all type of model,” Hanke told the Business Journal in September.
The Jamboree site “was in planning” at the same time as the residential version of the center, said Annette Walker, executive vice president, strategic services, at Irvine-based St. Joseph Health, a St. Joseph Hoag network partner.
“The service offerings are similar,” Walker said, adding that businesses were looking for rapid access to primary care for their workers, as well as services for managing stress, nutrition and fitness.
St. Joseph Health’s Program
Jamboree Center’s Wellness Corner was based on a similar program St. Joseph Health has offered its own employees for about 18 months, according to Walker.
St. Joseph Health said its workers who used the center reported a 29% decrease in inactivity, a 4% decrease in obesity, and an 18.5% decrease in stress levels.
The Irvine Co. views the addition of the healthcare centers as a way to keep pace with the needs of tenants.
“Easy and accessible healthcare and lifestyle-management services are a top concern of forward-thinking employers,” said Doug Holte, president of Irvine Company Office Properties.
Holte added that the new offering at Jamboree Center “further aligns us with our business customers.”
Services such as nutritional coaching can “hopefully help in the prevention side of wellness” for Jamboree Center tenants, said Lauren Kelly, chief marketing officer of Irvine Company Office Properties.
St. Joseph Hoag did focus groups as it was planning the centers.
“When we first described it, [some businesses] didn’t quite get it,” Walker said.
The ability to get care quickly at an office complex on site helped bring them around to the concept, she said.
Wellness Corners “are founded on a simple notion: Help people attain a healthy lifestyle by being more available to them. We believe if we do that well, we will have not just healthier individuals, but healthier communities will also be possible,” Walker said.
Population Health Management
She said Wellness Corners are a key element of St. Joseph Hoag’s focus on population health management.
Population health management is intended to treat a group of patients—tenants in an office park, for example, or St. Joseph Hoag Health customers—by tailoring healthcare delivery to the group’s particular needs.
St. Joseph Hoag plans to give the Jamboree Wellness Corner at least a year to operate before it evaluates performance, and “we will look at trends,” Walker said.
“It takes a while for people to remember that we are there.”
Plans call for regular reviews of which types of health services are being used and which businesses are using them.
Walker reiterated that there will be more Wellness Corners “in locations yet to be determined.”
St. Joseph Hoag Health is a project of St. Joseph Health and Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian. St. Joseph operates St. Joseph Hospital in Orange, St. Jude Medical Center in Fullerton, and Mission Hospital, with campuses in Mission Viejo and Laguna Beach. Hoag has hospitals in Newport Beach and Irvine.
