A new study by  The Oxygen Plan introduces The New Health Metric, The Stress Number™, and shows stress trends for Americans over the past 12 months. The aggregate Stress Number™ for over 29,000 Americans’ home, work and social lives was tabulated over the past year. Stress is on the rise and stress in one life dimension; home, work or social, impacts the other dimensions and overall health, wellness and happiness.

September 20, 2010 — The Oxygen Plan Corporation introduces the new health metric – The Stress Number™, after 29,000 respondents have completed the 30 question The Oxygen Plan Stress Test. To assess individual stress, there were 10 questions for home, work and social. The scoring for each question ranged from 0 – 100, whereby a score of 0 means extreme stress (red), to 100, meaning stress free (green).

Key Findings:
People are more stressed by their home lives than either their work or social lives. Over the past year, the average Stress Number™ for home life (47) fell below the Stress Number™ for social life (53), and work life(52). One in 5 Americans is living with extreme stress at home – with a Stress Number™ less than 33. Meanwhile 14% are experiencing extreme stress at work and 9% are experiencing extreme stress in their social lives. Only 20%, 18% and 12% of people are living stress free, in the green, at work, social and home respectively.

According to Dr. Donald E. Williams, board-certified clinical health psychologist (American Board of Professional Psychology/ABPP), and Chief Science Officer, The Oxygen Plan, ‘Our Stress Test data show what many suspect – there is a tremendous amount of stress in our society and in our relationships, taking a huge toll on our health, our relationships, and our economy. For individuals, the impact of stress at work takes a tremendous personal toll in terms of lost productivity, absenteeism and burnout. Our data also show that stress disrupts home and social lives, leading to even more problems for individuals in the form of deteriorating social support and troubled relationships. In the work place, stress also manifests in group health, turnover and disability expenses. For employers, that translates to a cost of $4,888 per employee per year! The total annual economic impact of stress in the U.S. is $400 Billion.’

“Never before has it been possible to measure, compute, report, trend or aggregate a stress metric as it relates to personal health or organizational cost,” says Dr. Williams. Now, we are able to assess stress, calculate the Stress Number™, provide The Oxygen Plan program and re-measure stress for individuals or organizations. ‘The Stress Number™ is a significant development in the field of health metrics.’ ‘We feel the Stress Number™ should be used to help individuals and organizations manage health and health care costs – just like blood pressure and cholesterol levels,” adds Eric Lucas, Founder and CEO of The Oxygen Plan. ‘Because stress in the home or social life impacts employees at work, and vice versa, it’s in employers’ best interest to know the aggregate Stress Number™ for their employee populations. Now they can establish a baseline, implement programs toward improvement, and reassess their employees.’

The Oxygen Plan Corporation has a new patent-pending behavior change program designed to help people recognize and reduce stress, live healthier, happier lives while helping employers lower health care costs and improve productivity and employee engagement. The Oxygen Plan, co-developed by Eric Lucas and Dr. Williams, is the only stress reduction program to use a simple green, yellow, red color coding to easily facilitate stress recognition and behavior change for individuals and organizations. For more information visit https://theoxygenplan.com