Engauge CEO White Paper

Engauge CEO White Paper

• 1.
  Healthcare benefits andinitiatives can cost – or save – your company millions of dollars. Here’s how to give your company the leading edge on today’s health and wellness business strategy. Employee Health is a Business Decision You may think healthcare benefits and wellness initiatives aren’t an issue for the C-suite. $61.2 billion says think again. According to a global leader in human resource solutions, that’s the amount 516 large employers spend annually on health care benefits for employees and their dependents. As the alarming escalation of healthcare costs continues to ravage business profitability, what was once exclusively a human resources issue is now a hot topic in the executive suite. How can executives impact and control the cost of healthcare benefits? By treating it like any other major business objective. Why the impact of benefits and wellness on profit margin is the hot topic in board rooms across the U.S. Healthcare and the CEO Inside: How the Traditional Benefits Continuum Kills Profitability The 3 Options for Attacking the Costs of Claims How (and Why) Population Health Management (PHM) Works Conclusion About Engauge Our three-step process Sources www.engauge4health.com
• 2.
  How the TraditionalBenefits Continuum Kills Profitability For decades, businesses have relied on health insurance brokers to work with human resources to develop competitive benefits packages for the company and its employees. The employee would pick a plan, manage their healthcare, and the company would pay the premiums for any doctor’s visits, prescription drugs and ER visits – no questions asked. But today’s businesses are starting to ask… “How are these healthcare dollars really being spent — and how do we reduce the costs for the business and our employees?” The health of a corporate community is a critical component of that business successfully achieving its strategic objectives. The 3 Options for Attacking the Costs of Claims Companies are fighting the rising costs of healthcare with various tactics – but which ones are most effective for long-term viability and profitability? Cost-shifting is reworking benefit design or employee contributions (sometimes both) to reduce cost to employers while increasing employee contributions. While this option may provide some immediate relief to corporate budgets, it has a minimal impact on the overall profit margin. Additionally, these increases place an enormous financial burden on employees and their families without addressing the costs of claims. Wellness programs offer educational and on-site support to employees in an effort to improve overall health in the hopes it will reduce claim costs. While some employees may lose weight or stop smoking by participating in wellness initiatives, the impact on claim costs is negligible. Population health management is a data-driven analytics platform that integrates multiple streams of health data on employer popula- tions, develops a strategy to improve the health of the population, then works with employees and providers to implement the plan – resulting in dramatically reduced claim costs for the employer, lower out-of-pocket costs for members, and better health for its employees. A recent study of a 2,400-employee organization reports the group saved $1.6 million in just two years through strategic population health management. How (and Why) Population Health Management (PHM) Works: Done well, a population health management (PHM) program is a breakthrough strategy that can save a company millions of dollars. It’s a fact: the wellness of your employees has an enormous impact on the profitability of your business. So how exactly does PHM fit into overall scheme of your business? PHM companies work with executives and human resource leaders to develop strategic health plans for companies based on measura- ble and quantifiable data. They identify high-risk employees, then work with that population and their providers to reduce claims, increase profitability, and improve the health of at-risk employees. Until now, the claims driving up the cost of benefits are rarely – if ever – scrutinized. But the fact is for every single dollar spent on health care benefits, a whopping $.72 is spent on the treatment of preventable conditions like diabetes, smoking-related health conditions and heart disease. For decades, traditional health care benefits approaches screened the low-claimant population and performed reactive disease manage- ment with the high-claimant population. When high-cost claimants are determined annually, only 30 percent were high-claimants the year before — which means 70 percent of the population becomes high-claimant annually because their risk was undetected through traditional wellness and disease management.
• 3.
  www.engauge4health.com Improving the healthof employees with these conditions, along with identifying employees at high-risk of developing these conditions, is the key to improving profitability by reducing healthcare costs. For example, if a business with 1,100 members spends $6.7 million annually has a population of 583 with common health risks like diabetes, heart disease, obesity, the company is spending $5.5 million – 82% of its total health expenditures – for only 53% of its employees. The other 47%? They’re managing their health and costing only $1.2 million per year. Now, imagine if this business strategically identifies the higher-risk employees through HIPAA-compliant technology, determines a course of action to improve health outcomes, then transforms the lives of your employees through provider/employee education and action. Decreasing medical and pharmaceutical claims and hospital admissions by 10% is a cost savings of $670,000 per year. Reduce it by 5%? You’re looking at a cost-savings of $335,000 per year. According to the Washington Post, the average ER visit costs more than the average month’s rent. Conclusion One of the significant reasons for the alarming rise in healthcare costs are high-risk employees not receiving the intervention, informa- tion and proper medical care they need to take control of improving their health. Leading companies like Dow Chemical, Viking Range Corporation, and The Men’s Warehouse, are recognizing that tying critical corporate objectives to the health of its employees is key to successfully reaching its goals and are investing accordingly. Scrutinizing benefits and claim expenditures, then identifying key areas of improvement through data-driven analysis, is critical to successfully improving profitability by decreasing healthcare expenditures. Recognizing the success of corporate goals and priorities are tied directly to healthcare management, competitive businesses are utilizing the actionable data and strategies of PHM to reduce healthcare spending while improving the wellness of their top asset: their employees. They get healthier. You save money. It’s that simple. About Engauge Engauge is a population health management solution that helps busi- nesses manage healthcare costs by creating healthier organizations. Engauge uses cutting-edge technology to integrate data, determine where an organization is on the healthcare continuum, then engages employees and providers to get real, measurable results. Our three-step process: • Analyze (descriptive analytics) • Strategize (prescriptive analytics) • Transform (predictive analytics) First, we gather and analyze data with HIPAA-compliant technology that creates a clear picture of the health of your employees. Medical and pharmacy claims, biometric screenings and self-reported data are all unified into one report to provide a clear blueprint of the health of your organization. Next, we strategize and define real business solutions for your company through prescriptive analytics. Engauge helps you clearly see where your employees are on the care continuum, identifies high-risk employees, and determines the best course of action to close gaps in care. Then we transform the lives of your employees – and your business – by educating employees and providers with real, actionable steps to improving health. We even provide predictive analytics, allowing providers and employees to take action before they become high-risk. This translates to fewer medical and pharmaceutical claims, decreased hospital admissions and significant reductions in per-employee costs. The result? Better health for your workforce, and a better bottom-line for your business. Sources Forbes, Jaspen, Bruce; “Workers Share of Health Care Costs Nearly $5,000 at Large Companies.” NavigatorMD; case study, 2014. Printed with permission.
• 4.
  Get Healthy. SaveMoney. Contact Engauge Population Health Management today: www.engauge4health.com or call 404-316-2137. Give us 30 days and we’ll give you a road map to a healthier workforce – risk-free. "Our health care approach is reactive, as a result, we have a world of chronic disease, most of which are poorly managed, such as congestive heart failure, high blood pressure and diabetes.” "Now comes a new wave of technology to not only improve the outlook for the chronic diseases of today but shift the capability, for the first time, to true prevention." Eric Topol M.D One of the top ten researchers in medicine