Discovery Vitality Continues to decrease bennefits (First the Gym then ....)

Wait until you go to the emergency room after a traffic accident. Discovery want to you to sign a waiver affirming that you already have submitted a claim on the Road Accident Fund. No matter that you are bleeding out or have a broken leg, the hospital will, when they find out you have a Discovery Hospital Plan, request this. And, if you are on a nominated provider policy, you must attend the hospital of their choice. Not a bind if you are in a large city, but if you are in the country, beware.
 
diabolus said:
I'm not saying tests are not beneficial, but Discovery are contradicting themselves when they say they want you to "participate in a healthy lifestyle" more , yet they don't actually allow you to gain that many points in doing so.

Fitness Tests, Bio-kinetic Tests, Physio Tests , come on, seriously. These things are NOT FREE . For me to do all these tests every year can easily be R600-R900 . I'm not talking about the screening tests (the cholesterol,weight,sugar,HIV). I can understand the argument for doing the medical tests , which is usually a 15 minute thing and free and can indicate a variety of health issues.

The other tests however, the ones that you need to go to a Physio, Dietician or Bio-kinetics person , those are not free and they don't necessarily do anything (it might actually end up costing you more if one of those people decides you need to visit them regularly, trust me Physio is very expensive and you pay for that out of your savings account) . It's not like it's going to make me fit or even make me exercise. You get more points for going for a Fitness assessment than taking part in a regular 21km half marathon road race. Not only that, you can earn more points doing all these little "assessments" than actually -doing- something.

My only conclusion is, there are some sort of business benefit lurking in there between Discovery and Fitness related doctors. I bet , before this whole Fitness/Diet thing from Discovery, very few people ever knew what these people did, as you only encounter them if you are very active and serious about sport.
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Of course there is a business benefit. How else do you think these things work ?

Vitality rewards people with healthy lifestyles. Although people just try and work the system to get as much as possible out of it, it still serves a purpose though and you can live a better life by doing what they suggest.

However the reason it exists is to drive business. SO when people juk the system they have to change the rules.
 
After having it for years I only started making real use of Vitality this year and to be honest I think the reward of getting you to live a healthier lifestyle is worth it. And like most of the guys already mentioned it requires minimal effort to hit gold status.
 
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louisek said:
Wait until you go to the emergency room after a traffic accident. Discovery want to you to sign a waiver affirming that you already have submitted a claim on the Road Accident Fund. No matter that you are bleeding out or have a broken leg, the hospital will, when they find out you have a Discovery Hospital Plan, request this. And, if you are on a nominated provider policy, you must attend the hospital of their choice. Not a bind if you are in a large city, but if you are in the country, beware.
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That doesn't sound right, don't they treat you and recover the costs from RAF afterwards? Also if it's an emergency you can go to any hospital?
 
louisek said:
Wait until you go to the emergency room after a traffic accident. Discovery want to you to sign a waiver affirming that you already have submitted a claim on the Road Accident Fund. No matter that you are bleeding out or have a broken leg, the hospital will, when they find out you have a Discovery Hospital Plan, request this. And, if you are on a nominated provider policy, you must attend the hospital of their choice. Not a bind if you are in a large city, but if you are in the country, beware.
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But then you get exactly what you signed up for. Don't see a problem with this.
 
Slightly off-topic, but noticed last week, the online nutrition assessment ('Online Nutrition Centre'), has it fallen away? Can't find it anywhere.
 
Wyzak said:
You can get a Polar Heart rate monitor and earn points doing whatever it is you are doing. As long as you can maintain a heart rate above 60% for 30 minutes, or above 70% for bonus points.
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Geez, I would smoke those points! Did a 45km MTB race yesterday. 2h49 minutes with an average heart rate of 167bpm. My max heart rate is around 190, so I was sitting at around 89% for almost three hours.... but like we said earlier they impose strict limits on the healthy activity section so this would be maxed for me very early in the year anyway. Clearly they are not rewarding healthy activity, and hence a healthy lifestyle, as much as they'd have everyone believe.
 
RVQ said:
That doesn't sound right, don't they treat you and recover the costs from RAF afterwards? Also if it's an emergency you can go to any hospital?
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They do state this in their documentation :

Claiming for healthcare after a motor vehicle accident
Discovery Health pays for your healthcare expenses when you’re involved in a motor vehicle accident. According to the rules of the Discovery Health Medical Scheme, you need to lodge a claim with the Road Accident Fund. If your claim with the Road Accident Fund is successful and both Discovery Health Medical Scheme and the Road Accident Fund pay your medical expenses, you’ll need to reimburse the medical expenses paid by the Road Accident Fund to Discovery Health.
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So it is up to you to claim. Makes sense that they may get you to sign some form of agreement to this before treatment.

And yes, you are right with the nominated hospital. According to PMBs they are obligated to treat you at the nearest medical facility in an emergency but will transfer you to a nominated hospital once you have been stabilised.
 
tiaanels said:
What happened to the gym?
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Increased the cost.

BloemGuy said:
I get into heated discussions with friends, colleagues and family every year when Vitality announces changes to the points structure which upset them for some or other reason. Once one realise that Vitality is (1) a business and (2) intended to over time get you to live a healthier lifestyle, it clearly makes sense that they need to move the goalposts for earning points every year.
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Considering that Discovery are nearly completely clueless about what's healthy they're in no position to do so. Their dietary recommendations are particularly idiotic.

And because the business needs to break even (at least) or maybe even make a profit, they need to review benefits as well
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Discovery administrators rake in an absolute fortune.

Quite frankly, if I was in charge of Vitality I'd make that requirement way higher than 3 visits a month, and I suspect it will gradually move up to a level that makes health sense.
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Exercise can be very damaging to the human body, particularly as you get older. If I were to go to the gym more often I'd just spend less time there each visit to minimise the damage.

AlmightyBender said:
I have achieved 60000+ points this year excluding carryover points and it was so easy and inexpensive. It is very easy to get to gold. Also this was done with only one fitness assessment. You are allowed two and the points for that are huge.
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They didn't want to pay for those assessments, so I'm not having them done.

Nerfherder said:
Vitality rewards people with healthy lifestyles.
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No it doesn't. Part of the problem is that Discovery is still pushing 1970s/1980s concepts of what constitutes being healthy, and almost all of those ideas have since been discredited.
 
Well looking at how many hoops and complications there are now with vitality, i suspect it won't take long before most people don't see the point anymore. At some stage it was easy, gym was free and you got your discounts with relatively clear indicators. Nowadays, even the main reasons people join vitality are riddled with extra costs, i mean what is the gym costs now? Last i checked you now pay a "base" fee (like R60-R100 p/m) AND if you don't go x amounts per month you pay more. So if you do a quick calculation, you already pay a vitality fee (R120-R150 p/m) + the gym base fee + having to jump through all kinds of hoops , and you very well might end up paying relatively close to what a normal gym membership would cost.

If you are going 110% with the vitality thing, and actually using the rewards ; As in, you got the credit card, you got the medical aid + disability insurance + vehicle insurance and buy at Pick n Pay , then great. But if you're not totally "on board" with their program it becomes a big question mark as they make it more difficult to reap rewards from this system without paying more.

I am probably going to do some seriously calculations based on this year's usage to see whether i am really benefiting, i have a nasty suspicion i am spending more on things i didn't need to spend on in favor of getting "discounts" from retailers i don't really shop at.
 
noxibox said:
Exercise can be very damaging to the human body, particularly as you get older. If I were to go to the gym more often I'd just spend less time there each visit to minimise the damage.
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No it doesn't. Part of the problem is that Discovery is still pushing 1970s/1980s concepts of what constitutes being healthy, and almost all of those ideas have since been discredited.
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Those are rather bold statements you make. I would be interested to hear you elaborate on them a little.

Any exercise obviously carries an injury risk but I think you'll be hard pressed to find any study that shows no exercise to be better. And to me 3 visits to the gym per month just to get points falls into that category.

My impression is that Discovery are looking to encourage healthy eating, exercising and reducing bad habits like smoking and drinking. I'd be very interested to read the studies that show these to be ideas which have been discredited as ways to get healthy.
 
noxibox said:
Exercise can be very damaging to the human body, particularly as you get older. If I were to go to the gym more often I'd just spend less time there each visit to minimise the damage.
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It is very damaging only when people do things they are not supposed to do, and going to Virgin Active on a regular basis I can say people do these things more than I can keep count.

If you stay with the proper training methods, even when you are old, you will see massive results. Don't believe me, go have a look at all the old ballies doing something as simple as Stronglifts 5x5, see massive improvements, best they have seen their whole life, and this is guys at the age 40 or even 50+ !!!

You say exercise is more damaging that it is good....I have to call bs on that. I personally have seen improvement, as well as read the statements from others, and all I can say is, exercise is good when done right, compliment it with the correct eating and drinking habits, and you set yourself up for a very good life.
 
An issue with not carrying over points is that it actually acts as a disincentive to continuing to accumulate points once a person reaches the highest Vitality level they’re likely to achieve that year. If they have 70,000 points, but could reach 86,000 with additional effort, they’ll have no incentive to do so. Currently it would mean carrying over an extra 4,000 points, which would mean getting one level higher the next year. For various reasons that is the only way some people will be able to gradually achieve higher levels.

I don’t see anyone claiming no exercise is better, and it further has exactly nothing to do with the minimum number of gym visits. That has no bearing whatsoever since it relates only to retaining discounted gym membership.

Those older guys may well be able to do heavy lifting, but that doesn't mean they don’t pay for it later. You can’t even know what shape their bodies are in just by looking at them. There’s plenty of information available on the strain that regular intense exercise puts on the human body. The more you do the faster and more drastically you can wear it out. You either keep it moderate your whole life or tone it down as you get older and hope you haven’t already done too much damage or just keep going and suffer the consequences. There is no proper training method that can dodge this, only moderation. Worse still is that if having a healthy heart does keep you alive longer the medical aid ends up having to cover expensive surgery later to fix these other consequences that people like to ignore because they think that as much exercise as possible is a good idea. Simply encouraging people to exercise is thus not inherently promoting health.

Discovery use BMI, even though it has serious flaws, and they attach a lot of points to meeting this fantasy measure of fatness. Never mind that being ‘fat’ itself is not even an indicator of poor fitness or health (now or in the future). Nor is being fit-looking an indication of actually being fit, healthy or having a body that is in good condition. They apply a target heart rate measure that is just plain wrong. Their breakfast recommendation might as well be a couple of handfuls of sugar. Their entire recommended diet is similarly ridiculous, and outdated. The evidence of its abject failure is everywhere to see. Just as laughable are which foods get classified as healthy or not when buying from Pick n Pay. And they still push the old anti-salt nonsense which is entirely based on dodgy research and misapplication of research results. They further have shown no interest in keeping up with current research on diet, preferring to stick to the dogma. They’re entirely not credible as health promoters.

Then there’s the question of whether it’s a good idea to encourage regular testing for serious diseases in people who don’t have a family history of the disease. False positives are a problem and not without real risk.

You say exercise is more damaging that it is good....I have to call bs on that.
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Since that's not what I said...
 
Since I have to move over to Discovery with new employer soon, what does one do with Vitality points one accumilates?
 
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Noxibox, all Vitality is, is a way to gather very accurate data on your clients. That is their greatest ROI for the whole exercise which allows them to better model life expectancy and thereby, profiitibility.

Also please note that they are also changing the way points are being allocated in the first place so that you will have to do a hell of a lot to get to Gold the next year. I.e. you will have to go the extra mile which encourages positive health behaviour. By carrying over point you do great for a few years and then just chillax and let the carry over get you to Gold.

You are correct in that you didn't say that excercise = bad, but you are exaggerating the damage. Professional athletes and gym fanatics will likely get damaged long term but amateurs likely will not unless they do it in a retarded way and then that is their own fault.

On the food you are spot on but please keep in mind that the Vitality recommendations are infinately better than the person who is chowing KFC and McD's all the time. The low salt focus is a simple consequence of SA having a very high level of heart disease (i.e. read biggest cost for Discovery).

Everyone knows that BMI sucks. Its sucks big time. But can you please suggest other health/fitness measurements that can be feasibly implemented in a cost effective way? I think BMI is the best you have as a general and averaged guide. If your doctor starts talking about BMI only then do you need to get worried.
 
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