“Warren Buffett said it all: “GM is a health and benefits company with an auto company attached.” In fact, it spends more on health care than steel, just as Starbucks spends more on health care than coffee beans.” That means it is a little crazy to be taking advice from a broker who is not really motivated to help you provide better health at lower cost. In this very challenging time of inflation pressures and employee shortages, can you afford to ignore an opportunity to increase the value of the healthcare your employees receive and increase your profits while doing so? The 44 Fortune 500 companies who have been most successful in lowering overall employer-sponsored insurance costs increased profits by 3.5%.
Health Affairs is a leading health policy journal. In this article, they review the reasons you should bring healthcare decision making in house. Briefly, here is the problem: “There are two main barriers that have limited employers from purchasing health care benefits effectively. First, the way employers buy health insurance is complex. Employers rely on a variety of third parties to help them purchase employee health care benefits on behalf of their workforce. Unfortunately, most of these stakeholders have misaligned financial incentives. Secondly, most employers have not had access to usable, transparent price and quality information. The lack of such usable information limits employers’ ability to make informed purchasing decisions and monitor prices negotiated on their behalf. These undermining incentives and lack of transparency have resulted in employers paying high prices and plans that favor wide breadth of access against affordability.”
Health Affairs recommended three key strategies to lower your costs
Realign financial incentives
Employers rely on brokers, consultants, and third party administrators to manage their health benefits but the system is riddled with conflicts of illness. These advisors take a commission from the employer and also from the vendor organizations that they recommend to their clients.
Own, analyze, and use quality and financial data
In order to improve the value of healthcare services, employers must have access to and ownership of all relevant quality and financial data. Most insurance companies and TPAs retain control of the data and don’t allow clients to see it. A new law means employers have the right to see this data and they must see it if they are to increase value.
Implement innovative benefit design
Reduce cost sharing for employees that use provider networks that improve health and reduce costs.
We are working with consultants that have no conflicts of interest. They are there to help achieve what Health Affairs is recommending. We provide data to employers with complete transparency. We have a data platform that can take information from a third party administrator and provide robust data on clinical and financial performance. We have been working for a year and a half to use that same data platform to support provider networks in lowering costs and improving health at scale in patients with cardiovascular and related conditions. We can help you lower your healthcare cost by doing exactly what Health Affairs is recommending. We can help your executive team successfully manage your healthcare business.
Doesn’t the ageofpersonalization.com provide the Segway for saving our employers - giving them a platform and compelling vision from which to to turn the ship THEIR DOLLARS are paying for - to a True North type of direction?!!!