Wellness has become a bit of a force—odd as that phrase may sound—in the meetings and events industry.
In fact, a major marketing objective of Caesars Entertainment this year and beyond is to promote the importance of well-being at events, whether they be at a Caesars property, via its Meetings Wellness Menu or offsite from vetted wellness practitioners that work with the casino-resort meetings giant.
To really showcase what it has on offer, Caesars held its inaugural Caesars Entertainment Global Wellness Summit June 4-7 in Las Vegas at its Nobu Las Vegas at Caesars Palace property. With about 100 meeting planners and industry media in attendance, the event featured event space activations, wellness activities such as a hike, yoga and even rafting on the Colorado River, and the expertise of top wellness facilitators to guide attendees in sessions as well as field advice on incorporating wellness into meeting and event programs.
[Related: Lessons on Well-Being From the Inaugural Caesars Entertainment Global Wellness Summit]
In at least one very important metric, the effort was a success, as the co-CEO of Healthcare Advocate Summit was so impressed she booked a three-year contract with Caesars. The first Healthcare Advocate Summit, planned before the Caesars event, was held September 3-6 at Caesars Palace with more than 1,000 attendees representing everyone from doctors to patients, with the mission of helping patients receive quality healthcare without going into debt.
Compressed Timeline
“We got invited to the [Caesars Global] Wellness Summit back in June,” said Melissa Paige, co-CEO of Healthcare Advocate Summit. “We were only three months from the [Healthcare Advocate Summit] show and a little bit busy, and we weren't sure if we were going to make it or not, but we thought it was probably pretty important to go to something covering wellness. After going to it, we were like, ‘We’ve got to figure something out.’
“We've got some space. We have extra room. How can we turn around and implement these programs three months from the event?” she continued. “That’s pretty much how impactful it was. We were able to incorporate a couple of these things, but it was based off of the Wellness Summit and things that I'd never heard of, such as sound baths.”
[Related: Caesars' New Meetings Wellness Menu Prescribes a Healthy Dose of Program Options]
Although she was new to sound baths, that particular Caesars Wellness Summit session impacted Paige so much that she found a way to utilize it for their meeting the first full day of the show, following registration day.
“I felt it was good to utilize that type of complimentary therapy because everyone's just rushing and excited and going from different areas of the conference,” Paige said. “Everyone was just very grateful. They overall just felt calm, relaxed—almost ‘healed’—and then ready to conquer the rest of the day.”
Wellness-focused sessions incorporated at Healthcare Advocate Summit included Breathwork & Sound Bath and Morning Yoga programs.
And while a 7 a.m. call for the yoga program may seem like a big ask for a show in Las Vegas, Paige said attendees appreciated the opportunity to start their day in a calm, meditative state in the 24/7 Entertainment Capital of the World.
“Everyone was so happy and engaged, and I got pretty good feedback regarding the wellness portion,” she said, adding that besides having a positive personal effect for people in a very stressful industry, many doctor and nurse attendees came away thinking it would also benefit their patients. “Integrating the complimentary therapies with your patients is helping them to heal. It helps bring that nervous system down.”
In the end, Paige said, signups for the wellness programs were so popular that the event had to expand the Augustus Ballroom for what they expected to be a group of 30 to fit 80 attendees for the sound bath, for example.
[Related: Caesars Entertainment Culinary Exec Don Ross on the Brand's New Focus on Wellness]
The Practitioner
Healthcare Advocate Summit utilized Tiffany Zwinge Barger as a wellness practitioner for its sessions.
Zwinge Barger has worked in the healthcare industry for more than a decade, with her previous role conducting clinical research for immunotherapy trials for stage-four cancer patients, which demanded alternative methods to bring down blood pressure, for instance.
Leading the breathwork portions of sessions, Zwinge Barger found her previous experience working with cancer patients invaluable.
“I went from triaging patients in clinical research to [being a wellness practitioner] because I realized there's this huge role that healthcare isn't utilizing, right?” Zwinge Barger said. “When you're placing an IV, [patients] start sweating. You see their heart rate [increase].
“Let's say I train you in a workshop,” she continued. “Now, you're introduced to the breathwork that you can use to introduce and guide your patient through whatever therapy they're going through. My goal with the conference was to be that resource for the people that were involved there if they had any questions, like, ‘How can I use this with my patient with a spinal injury?’”
Having Caesars introduce them to a wellness practitioner who had an extensive background in healthcare was a big bonus for Healthcare Advocate Summit.
“There's a lot of people that I could have partnered with that Caesars either used at the Wellness Summit or they were close by,” Paige said. “For our group, it's not only if we implement wellness, but we implemented wellness with somebody who had a healthcare background and could relate. If somebody else was talking about a ‘code blue,’ they probably wouldn't be able to answer it in a way that was relatable.”
Well-Earned Wellness
Especially for attendees that work in stressful fields such as healthcare, Paige found that incorporating wellness activities was a natural choice.
“A lot of them actually don't get paid a lot to do this role, and they just have such huge hearts and empathy, and that's what brings them to work every day,” Paige said. “Of anybody who needs wellness, I think especially our group [does]. You hear of nurse burnout, healthcare burnout.”
And a lot of what Paige said can be extrapolated to any meeting attendee.
“You're trapping people together for 100 hours where it's just go, go, go. We're being fed more than we've ever been fed before,” she said, adding that healthcare professionals are especially deserving. “There’s a lot of focus on the doctors who are writing the prescriptions for the pharmaceutical companies, but what about the people who are responsible for that million-dollar drug authorization, who are usually locked in a basement without a window trying to help patients and make sure that they're taken care of?”
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The Caesars Wellness Summit experience and its impact on the Healthcare Advocate Summit had Paige thinking about the future as soon as the show wrapped.
“We’re already talking about what we're going to do next year,” she said. “We're going to be having one of our breakout rooms that will fit up to 200 people in there, if not more, and have it open all day for just the wellness sessions. I would love to figure out how we can do the sound bath and the meditation in the pool like we did at the Caesars Wellness Summit on air mattresses. I'd love to find creative spaces on the Caesars property to do these things. Let's break out of the box and do it differently.”
