Q:

What is Live Healthy Virginia?

According to the Center of Disease Control, an estimated 65% of U.S. adults ages 20 years and older are either overweight or obese, defined as having a Body Mass Index (BMI) of 25 or higher. In addition, more than 60% of the U.S. adult population does not engage in the recommended amount of physical activity and 25% are not active at all.

Live Healthy Virginia is a program designed to promote physical activity and proper nutrition to achieve or maintain a healthy body weight.  The goal is to impact individual behavior and the culture of work sites and communities to incorporate health into everyday life. As a team based program, it is designed to help Americans make positive lifestyle changes during the course of 100 days utilizing teamwork, support, and education.

All participants of Live Healthy Virginia will benefit in the form of healthier eating habits, increased physical activity levels, and a positive attitude.

Q:

How do I start a team?

Visit the Lieve Healthy Virginia homepage, and click on "Get Started", you will then be taken to a page where you will see a "Register Online" link in a box on the right side of the page. Click on this link to fill out the Live Healthy Virginia registration form.

Each team will have a designated captain who will have regular access to a computer and the internet. To create a team, this person will need the names of all team members and e-mail addresses if available. Each team can have 2-10 team members. Upon completion of the registration form you will be prompted for payment for your entire team using a major credit card on a secure site.

Q:

How do I sign up my company or organization to use Live Healthy Virginia as a wellness program?

If you are a wellness, human resources, or benefits coordinator for your company or organization, Live Healthy Virginia may be a useful wellness tool for your employees or members. Please visit the Corporate/Organizations page to fill out a short form to tell us about your company or organization. A Live Healthy Virginia representative will contact you within 48 hours to help you initiate the program.

Q:

What if a team member does not have computer or internet access?

This person can still participate on a Live Healthy Virginia team. The team captain will report this person's weight and/or minutes of activity online. It will also be the responsibility of the captain to pass the weekly tips and health information on to this participant. However, when a team member accesses their personal participant panel online with their username and password, the team captain will not be able to enter data for this person if they discontinue to use their web access. The captain will only be able to enter a team member's data if the team member DOES NOT login with their username and password. This is to protect the privacy of individual team members.

Q:

What is the role of the team captain?

At a minimum, team captains are responsible for registering their team and entering montly reports of Minutes of Physical Activity and/or Weight for team members without computer or internet access. More importantly, team captains play a key role in keeping the team members motivated and involved throughout the 100 Day Challenge. A Captain's Handbook with ideas for team activities will be available for each team captain.

Q:

As a team captain how do I register another team?

A team captain can be a member of only ONE team but may be the captain for multiple teams. To sign up another team you must login to your captain's dashboard. Click the "Programs" tab, then click "Friends and Family" on the left navigation. There will be a link in a box titled "Register Now!" on the right. This will allow one captain to be the captain of multiple teams under the same username and password.

Q:

What counts for Minutes of Activity and how do I record minutes of activity or weight loss?

Pretty much anything that you deem to be intentional physical activity can be counted. For example, walking from your desk to the elevator does not count but intentionally taking the stairs instead of the elevator does. Taking walks, dancing, shoveling snow, swimming and other activities can be logged. Activity done on the job also counts. The idea is to track how much daily time you spend being physically active and then try to increase it.

You can track your daily activity or weight when you login to your participant panel online. There is a Daily Journal available to help you record the time you spend doing physical activity.

If your team is registered in the Weight Loss Division each team member will submit their current weight on the program start date (January 16). Each week team members will submit their updated weight. Do not enter pounds lost or gained. The website will calculate a total team weight and rank the team based on the percentage of total team weight lost since the previous week. For example, if a 3-person team weighed a total of 475 pounds in January and then 466 pounds in February they have lost 9 pounds and it will be shown as -0.981% on the leaderboard.