InFocus

Law enforcement leaders recognize that officer wellness is a critical operational priority. But in an era of tightening budgets and reduced staffing, agencies can’t afford to invest in unlimited menus of programs or in programs that look good on paper but fail to move the needle on officer or staff wellness. What we know about the risks officers face and how to address those risks is growing, though more research into what works and how best to implement it is still needed.

We can look outside the profession for some inspiration. More than a decade ago, Johnson and Johnson (J&J) established a comprehensive “Culture of Health” that integrates physical, mental, emotional, and financial well-being into the core of their operations through a global, 12-program framework (Quelch & Knoop, 2014). The initiative is rooted in the company’s “Credo,” which treats employee well-being as both a moral responsibility and as “inseparable from the health of the business.” A financial analysis of the J&J program showed measurable reductions in medical care expenditures, with the most significant gains appearing in years three and four after program launch (Goetzel et al., 2002).

Aspects of J&J’s approach can be adapted for policing, particularly its organizational and leadership focus, the use of data-driven customization for its workforce, its educational components, and its commitment to measuring impact.

The Big Picture

Law enforcement is a high-stress career that takes a serious toll on the body and mind. Research confirms that officers face higher mortality rates than those in comparable careers, and that elevated risk is associated with the stressors of the job, including stressors that originate inside the organization (Tanksley et al., 2025). The particulars of an officer’s background and the types of assignments they receive and incidents they respond to all influence how stress accumulates (Blumberg et al., 2024). There are opportunities to target resources toward groups of officers at greater risk due to these organizational, operational, and other factors, but what succeeds or fails will be determined locally, by you, within your agency.

It’s not enough to establish a program and hope for the best. In order to make the best use of resources and see a measurable impact, agencies need to find effective ways to encourage engagement at the start of a new program and eventually evaluate effectiveness and de-implement approaches that aren’t working. In short, implementation matters as much as the program design.

J&J, for instance, suspended a weight-reduction incentive program when it showed poor outcomes and low participation, redirecting those resources toward more effective strategies (Quelch & Knoop, 2014). An EAP that lacks familiarity with police culture and goes largely unused is a candidate for de-implementation, assuming a greater risk or gap isn’t created as a result.

What We Know

Unequal Mortality & Impacts – Officers face higher mortality rates than the general working-age population, linked to both operational and organizational stressors (Tanksley et al., 2025). Research has shown that female officers face particularly elevated relative mortality risk, while Hispanic officers and officers with college degrees may draw on more effective coping strategies (Blumberg et al., 2024). These kinds of differences within agency workforces can inform how agencies design and target wellness investments.

The Power of Peer Support – Peer support has been rated as the most effective wellness service by officers who use it (Martin & Drew, 2025). Research has found that structured peer programs contribute to post-traumatic growth and prevent more costly long-term disability claims (Donovan, 2022), though others have called for additional research to assess its impact more rigorously (Bowers, Beidel, Steigerwald, 2025).

Targeted Mental Health Services – While 93.3% of surveyed agencies provide EAPs or specialist mental health programs, these services are frequently underutilized (Martin & Drew, 2025). Programs staffed by professionals who understand police culture significantly outperform generic providers, because officers don’t trust clinicians who lack context for the unique stressors of policing.

Fatigue’s Impact – Chronic sleep deprivation is a physiological ceiling on every other wellness effort. Being awake 17 hours impairs performance at a level comparable to a 0.05% blood alcohol concentration (Vande Weerd, 2021). A history of rotating shift work is also independently associated with higher rates of hypertension, high cholesterol, and diabetes (Mumford et al., 2021).

Stigma as a Persistent Barrier – Concerns about confidentiality and career consequences remain meaningful obstacles to program utilization. A 2023 national survey found that 80% of officers reported low workplace stigma around help-seeking, an 11-percentage-point improvement since 2021, and that leaders who model help-seeking behavior accelerate this progress (Martin & Drew, 2025).

Individual Variability – One-size-fits-all programs ignore real differences in risk and coping across officer subgroups. For example, only about 27% of officers in one national study used the most effective, task-oriented coping strategies, officers with fewer years of education were more likely to rely on less effective approaches (Blumberg et al., 2024).
Where the Gaps Remain

Practice gaps persist in agencies that rely on a single resource, such as a standalone EAP or a single peer support team, since it’s difficult to address the full range of wellness risks officers face all at once. The evidence calls for a comprehensive program of wellness resources tailored to the specific profile of the agency, rather than reliance on any single service (Blumberg et al., 2024).

But how do you expand the number of programs you provide while keeping an eye on cost and ROI? Even as the evidence base has grown, we still lack sufficient research to determine precisely what works, for whom, and under what conditions, and we face a particular shortage in implementation research that can answer not just what to do but how to do it effectively in real agency environments (Bowers et al., 2025; Beckley et al., 2023).

Shift scheduling illustrates the complexity: rotating shifts are associated with worse long-term health outcomes, yet many prefer 12-hour schedules for the work-life balance they may provide and fewer handoffs. The answer is rarely a mandate, but a process that weighs preferences alongside the evidence on health consequences.

What Agencies Can Do Now

Despite the uncertainties that remain, there are concrete steps agency leaders can take today:

Anchor Wellness in Core Values and Leadership – Move wellness from a human resources obligation to a central part of the agency’s mission. Leaders need to model healthy behaviors visibly. A culture of health only becomes the default when it’s demonstrated at the top (Quelch & Knoop, 2014).

Use Data to Target Specific Risks – Deploy tools to identify the actual risks affecting your specific workforce such as elevated stress, fatigue, or cardiovascular risk factors and track outcomes over time to connect work conditions to disability claims and lost work days (Quelch & Knoop, 2014; Mumford et al., 2021).

Audit What You Have and Remove What Isn’t Working – Evaluate existing programs using utilization data and outcomes. Programs that aren’t being used and aren’t producing results should be de-implemented and replaced with higher-impact alternatives.

Address Fatigue as a Strategic Priority – Review shift-length policies in light of the health evidence. Research has shown that officers on 10-hour shifts average significantly more sleep per week and report better work-life balance and higher job satisfaction than those on traditional 8-hour shifts (Amendola, et. al., 2012). Scheduling shifts with a focus on forward rotation (day to evening to night) and the circadian rhythm also deserve serious consideration (National Policing Institute, 2026; Mumford et al., 2021).

Formalize Peer Support and Normalize Help-Seeking – Invest in clinically supervised peer support teams, which officers themselves identify as the most effective resource available (Martin & Drew, 2025). Pair that investment with leadership engagement that treats stress and fatigue as conditions to be managed, not personal failings.

The Bottom Line

Rigorous data collection, a willingness to de-implement what doesn’t work, and sustained leadership commitment can transform wellness from a peripheral benefit into a genuine strategic advantage (Quelch & Knoop, 2014; Goetzel et al., 2002).

For law enforcement leaders, the path forward starts with three foundational commitments:

• Formalize wellness as an organizational responsibility embedded in your agency’s mission.
• Deploy a data-driven risk assessment before launching or expanding programs.
• Evaluate what you already have with the same honesty you would apply to any other operational program.

The agencies that approach wellness with this discipline will be better positioned to recruit, retain, and sustain the officers they need.

Every agency is different, and a wellness initiative built for a different agency may not deliver results for yours. NPI’s Workforce Wellness Analysis helps you assess what your officers actually need, identify the programs most likely to get results, and stop investing in services that aren’t producing outcomes. Find out how NPI can help you build a wellness strategy grounded in evidence and matched to your agency’s specific population.

Explore NPI’s Workforce Wellness Analysis

References
Amendola, Karen L.; Weisburd, David; Hamilton, Erin E.; Jones, Greg J.; Slipka, Michael. The Shift Length Experiment: What We Know About 8-, 10-, and 12-Hour Shifts in Policing. National Policing Institute, 2012.

Beckley, A., Wang, J., & Birch, P. (2023). Are organisational responses by police forces appropriate to adequately safeguard police officer wellness? A review of the scientific evidence. Safer Communities, 22(4), 312-326. https://doi.org/10.1108/SC-05-2023-0015

Blumberg, D. M., Mumford, E. A., Park, J. E., O’Leary, M. S., & Liu, W. (2024). The role of coping styles in US law enforcement officer health and wellness. Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 39, 118-130. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-023-09625-y

Bowers, C., Beidel, D. C., & Steigerwald, V. L. (2025). Peer support programs for first responders: A critical review and research roadmap. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 22, 1532. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph22101532

Donovan, N. (2022). Peer support facilitates post-traumatic growth in first responders: A literature review. Trauma, 24(4), 277-285. https://doi.org/10.1177/14604086221079441

Goetzel, R. Z., Ozminkowski, R. J., Bruno, J. A., Rutter, K. R., Isaac, F., & Wang, S. (2002). The long-term impact of Johnson & Johnson’s health & wellness program on employee health risks. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine, 44(5), 417-424. http://doi.org/10.1097/00043764-200205000-00010

Martin, S., & Drew, J. M. (2025). Critical issues in policing survey: Comprehensive report of 2023 survey findings. National Fraternal Order of Police & Griffith Criminology Institute, Griffith University.

Mumford, E. A., Liu, W., & O’Leary, M. S. (2025). U.S. law enforcement officers’ stress, job satisfaction, job performance, and resilience: A national sample. Police Quarterly, 28(1), 104-126. https://doi.org/10.1177/10986111241253851

Mumford, E. A., Maitra, P., Liu, W., & Taylor, B. G. (2021). A nationally representative study of law enforcement shiftwork and health outcomes. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Hygiene, 18(4-5), 192-202. https://doi.org/10.1080/15459624.2021.1876876

National Policing Institute. (2026, January 27). Shift work, fatigue, and overtime in policing: Balancing officer wellness and public safety. https://www.policinginstitute.org/infocus/infocus-shift-work-fatigue-and-overtime-in-policing-balancing-officer-wellness-and-public-safety/

Quelch, J. A., & Knoop, C. I. (2014). Johnson & Johnson: The promotion of wellness (HBS Case No. 9-514-112). Harvard Business School Publishing.

Tanksley, P. T., Barnes, J. C., Blair, J. P., & Martaindale, M. H. (2025). Mortality among law enforcement officers in the United States: A population-wide analysis of the National Occupational Mortality Surveillance data, 2020-2023. The Lancet Regional Health – Americas, 52, 101270. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lana.2025.101270

Vande Weerd, R. (2021). Trying times for law enforcement may call for alternate work schedules. Police1.