Health Insurance Daily

Expert Offers How-to's On Saving Health Care Costs for employers

Mark Roman, head health-care guru for Electronic Data Systems,the Dallas-based IT giant, has a number of suggestions for employers struggling to control escalating health-care costs, many of them especially relevant here in the high-cost Bay Area.

Per the San Francisco Business Times, the following are Roman's money-saving recommendations:

Educate employees by providing access to health-care information and educational programs, such as web-based consumer tools.

Offer workers incentives to make crucial lifestyle changes, such as stopping smoking and losing weight. A handful of major disease categories contribute to the bulk of all health-care costs, and many are preventable. Tailoring co-pays and deductibles also can reinforce cost-effective -- and healthy -- choices.

Make health an important part of the company's corporate culture. Provide health-related activities such as on-site health screenings, discounted gym memberships and company-sponsored fitness events.

Combat obesity-related health-care costs by providing healthy food choices in vending machines and company cafeterias and at company events.

Provide care-management or disease-management programs for employees with costly or chronic diseases. These programs -- either online or offered through local health-care providers -- can help participants learn to better manage their health.

Consider consumer-directed health plans, "a powerful new strategy" to reduce employers' health-care costs. These plans offer workers a set amount of money to spend on health care throughout the year (typically paired with catastrophic coverage as well), and "empower them to take control of their own health."

Consider benefits-management outsourcing, which allows a company to focus on its core business by outsourcing H.R. functions such as benefits administration.

Demand more from insurance companies, and take an active role in evaluating doctors and hospitals to find those that offer the most effective care for costly diseases. Couple these efforts with partnerships with local hospitals, clinics and physicians to emphasize the importance of healthy lifestyle choices.

posted by Mike @ 3:10 PM