Hospital workers fail to set the model for appropriate healthy behavior among working people in the United States as a new research found they have higher healthcare spending, visit a physician less frequently and are less healthy.

Hospital employees have 10 percent higher healthcare spending compared to the general employee population, according to a research from Thomson Reuters. Taking into account their families, the costs increase to 13 percent above the average.

Hospital workers and their families had fewer visits to the physician but are 22 percent more likely to visit the emergency room, the research noted. They also showed an 8.6 percent greater illness burden and were more likely to be diagnosed with chronic illnesses such as asthma, diabetes, congestive heart failure, HIV, hypertension and mental illness, the report said.

"Ideally, the healthcare workforce would be a model for healthy behaviors and the appropriate use of medical resources," said Raymond Fabius, MD, chief medical officer for the Healthcare business of Thomson Reuters. "Unfortunately, our data suggests that the opposite is true today. Hospitals that tackle this issue can strengthen their business performance and community service."

The study analyzed a total of 1.1 million hospital workers and compared them with 17.8 million workers in other industries both with employer-sponsored insurance for a 1 year period.