News Release

Mercy Medical Center Participates in Lighten Up Iowa

More than 200 employees at Mercy Medical Center are participating in the 2006 Lighten Up Iowa program, a five-month program designed to encourage Iowans to make positive changes toward healthier lifestyles.

According to Andrea Barnett, Mercy Medical Center Wellness coordinator, Mercy has 23 teams registered with the Lighten Up Iowa program this year. Each team has approximately six to 10 members including a team captain who is responsible for reporting the team activity each week.

The Lighten Up Iowa program began on January 18 and to date, Mercy employees have a total of 338,580 minutes of exercise recorded.

“Mercy’s participation demonstrates that our employees are supportive of a state-wide commitment to health,” said Barnett adding that this is the third year Mercy has participated in the program. “The first two years, we had approximately 60 employees participate,” said Barnett, “We are so excited that this year 210 employees signed up for the effort.”

Teams participating with the Lighten Up Iowa program can compete in either a weight loss division or minutes of activity division or both. According to Barnett, all Mercy teams are participating in the minutes of activity division, but a few are also tracking their weight lost.

The Lighten Up Iowa program will continue until May 31.