Orriant, Ray Merrill

Category:  Wellness

Short Summary of Company’s Marketing Claim:

“A New Scientific Study Proves Wellness Works”

Materials Being Reviewed:

http://www.orriant.com/File/4072ee6c-2bcd-43a5-83b6-e9035c8c0f1a

Questions for Orriant and Ray Merrill:

When you say “a new internationally-published study proves wellness works,” are you taking into account that the “international” journal publishing the work has a Zero impact factor, meaning that essentially no one believes anything they publish has enough value to cite?

ANS: Refused to answer

Are you attributing the fact that “participants had fewer health claims than non-participants” to your program, rather than to the obvious non-observable variable that participants are motivated whereas non-participants are not?

ANS: Refused to answer

Are you familiar with Health Fitness Corporation’s demonstration that participants will outperform non-participants even in the absence of a program? (See the year 2005 below — no program but participants outperformed non-participants nonetheless.)

ANS: Refused to answer

You also note that “those with the greatest health risks” had the most improvement.”  Are you familiar with Dee Edington’s work that says those with the greatest health risks will improve the most even in the absence of a program, due to the natural flow of risk?

ANS: Refused to answer

Non-participants’ medical costs were “2.9x greater” (about $4000 vs. about $1400).   This, of course, is the record for the hugest savings ever claimed from a wellness program.  Since government data shows that wellness-sensitive medical events account for only 4% of total costs or about $200/person, where did the other $2400/person in savings come from?

ANS: Refused to answer

Why didn’t the authors plausibility-check the entire population using a wellness-sensitive medical event analysis?

 ANS: Refused to answer