Study Finds Staggering Cost Of Treating Diabetics
NEW YORK - One out of every eight U.S. federal health care dollars is spent treating people with diabetes, a study found, and advocates are calling for the creation of a government post to oversee coordination of spending on treatment and prevention among federal agencies.
The study, based on federal spending data from 2005, looked at various government health programs to determine how much was spent on diabetics versus non diabetics. It found it cost the U.S. government $79.7 billion more to treat people with the disease, or some 12 percent of the $645 billion in total federal health care spending projected that year.
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Diabetes Cost.
Some Companies Are Helping Workers Look After Aging Parents
Ann Brewster had been caring for her aged parents for years before she realized the demands were eroding her health.
Shuttling them to doctors' appointments, rushing home from work to make them dinner, coping with her mother's disorientation -- all were taking a toll. Gradually, Ms. Brewster, a financial analyst at International Business Machines in Austin, Texas, noticed she was increasingly tense, and sometimes sinking into confusion herself. Feeling isolated and facing "enormous" stress, Ms. Brewster tried a new kind of elder-care benefit from her employer: a caregiver-wellness program.
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Caregiver-Wellness.
Tips For Safe Summer Workouts
Weight loss tends to be easier when you exercise as well as eat wisely. But is it safe to work out when the temperature's soaring? We asked William Sukala, MS, CSCS, a clinical exercise physiologist in the Cardiac Rehabilitation department at Sharp Memorial Hospital in San Diego, to answer some common questions about exercising when it's hot outside.
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Safety Tips.
Health Insurance Inflation Is Slowing Down
Employers can breathe a slight sigh of relief because increases in health insurance costs will not reach double digits in 2008, PricewaterhouseCoopers predicts.
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Health Insurance.
Successful Consumer-Driven Health Plans Integrate Wellness And Prevention
Health care plan members taking greater responsibility for health care decisions “present a viable opportunity to address shortcomings in the [health care] system,” according to an Aon Consulting report entitled The Impact of Consumer-Directed Health Plans with Integrated Health Improvement Services on Health Care Consumers.
The review paper was prepared by Tom Lerche, health care practice leader in Aon’s health and benefits practice. “In particular, consumer-directed health plans with integrated health promotion and wellness programs and member decision-support tools achieve stronger success in motivating and modifying member behavior to reduce health risk factors and health services utilization,” Mr. Lerche wrote.
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Consumer Directed Health Plans.
Men, Weight and Health: Gain a Little, Lose a Lot
Did you know that there are more overweight men in the U.S. than women? According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's 2005 National Health Interview Survey, 67.5% of adult men have a Body Mass Index (BMI) over 25, while about 52% of women meet this BMI cut-off for overweight.
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Weight Control.
In Health Care, Cost Isn’t Proof of High Quality
Stark evidence that high medical payments do not necessarily buy high-quality patient care is presented in a hospital study set for release today.
In a Pennsylvania government survey of the state’s 60 hospitals that perform heart bypass surgery, the best-paid hospital received nearly $100,000, on average, for the operation while the least-paid got less than $20,000. At both, patients had comparable lengths of stay and death rates.
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High Payments.
Benefits Can Improve Business Success
Employers realize strong benefits can attract great talent and retain key employees, thus reducing turnover cost. Some even understand that benefits done right can improve the company’s bottom line.
The Principal Financial Group and a panel of employee benefits experts recently recognized 10 firms for successfully balancing employee benefits with corporate performance. Those firms took innovative approaches to wellness programs, automatic enrollment measures, employee stock ownership plans and defined benefit retirement plans.
Information provide by Benefit News 2-13-07
Health Care Gets a Better IT Prescription
The health care industry can expect to get a big shot in the arm in the coming months from IT vendors as more and more top-tier OEMs look to invest considerable time and money in solutions for patients and doctors.
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IT Vendors.
Offerings, Attitudes On Benefits Vary
Employer offerings, benefit objectives and employee satisfaction with benefits vary greatly by industry, company size, job description, life stage and geographic region, according to a benchmarking report released this week by MetLife.
Worker retention was considered the most important benefits objective by more than half (55%) of employers, with the retail industry particularly placing high value on this objective (62%). An increasing number of small companies (50 employees or less) view work/life balance as the most important tool for retention (40%), compared to only 29% of the largest firms (25,000 or more workers).
Executives, white collar and blue collar workers rated medical coverage as the most important benefit. However, blue collar workers said prescription drug coverage was the second most important benefit to them, while executives and white collar workers ranked vacation second.
BenefitNews 6-7-07
Workers Opting Out Of Health Coverage
Workers are less likely to sign up for health insurance from their employer when they must pay a large share of its cost, a new study by the Kaiser Family Foundation concludes.
As the premium workers must pay for health insurance increases, fewer workers enroll. Surprisingly, 11% of workers refuse coverage even when no contribution is required on their part, the study shows. The take-up rate of employer-sponsored insurance declined 5.8% among low-income workers from 1999 to 2002, compared to 1.5% among individuals with incomes above 200% of the federal poverty level.
Article provided by Benefitnews 2-20-07
Employees Worried Over Health Care Costs
Troubled by escalating health care costs, more Americans are making the link between good health and lower medical bills, according to a new survey from HR consulting firm Watson Wyatt.
For instance, 61% of workers realized that staying healthy could reduce their deductibles and co-payments, and about 60% took steps to improve their health.
Workers are embracing wellness out of a fear of being unable to afford health care during retirement, the survey shows. Fifty-one percent of U.S. workers are worried about rising medical costs affecting their retirement lifestyle, while 68% think their employers would increase health insurance premiums in the next two years.
Information provided by Benefit News 5-29-07
The Return Of The House Call
Rather than have employees misuse emergency rooms for minor ailments, Microsoft and some other employers are beginning to contract with providers who can deliver health care to employees via the old-fashioned house call. Technology makes it easy to transport a doctor’s tools of the trade, visits are unhurried, and the cost is far less than an ER visit.
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House Call.
