3 ways in which companies can make health care more affordable

Companies are struggling with the high cost of health services for their employees. While companies prioritize the well-being of their employees, health benefits are often their most important expenses, after the cost of the goods and services they provide. Health care costs sponsored by employers should increase by 9% in 2025.
Large employers can use data -based strategies to help reduce the cost of health care. Here are three areas that employers can contact to make health care more affordable for themselves and their employees without sacrificing quality.
1) Measure the GLP-1 results
GLP-1 are a hot topic. This class of drugs has existed for almost 20 years to treat diabetes, but use has developed exponentially to deal with obesity in recent years.
A recent KFF health monitoring survey has revealed that around one in eight American adult claims to have taken a GLP-1. The class of drugs continues to develop with extensions on the label to reduce the risk of cardiovascular death, heart attack and stroke, as well as dozens of clinical trials in progress to put GLP-1 drugs on the market.
GLP-1 will be an important part of the drug landscape in the foreseeable future. Employers must understand the financial cost and the clinical results they achieve. However, the measure of the success of GLP-1 requires sophistication of data.
Employers must combine medication, medical, biometric, laboratory and others to monitor use and results. They must also understand how weight management and diabetes programs affect the results and know if they get a good return on investment (king). Beyond the use of health care, data on disabled people and absences can help employers understand the return on investment from the productivity point of view.
Understanding the cost of GLP-1 and their health impact can help a business determine how to manage these prescriptions over time.
2) Target mental health and well-being
One in five American adults suffers from a mental illness each year and less than half of them receive treatment. Employers are increasingly focusing on mental health to support the well-being of their employees. Many companies now proactively provide tools and services, such as private sessions with mental health professionals or external speakers to talk about mental health subjects.
To make a real difference, companies must connect people to the services they need. Several obstacles can prevent people from obtaining the help they need – financial concerns, pessimism concerning treatments, lack of support for loved ones, stigmatization or simply the perception that they can manage by themselves.
Data can help improve well-being, especially when companies combine their data with socio-demographic data to obtain a more complete image of their population. Find out more about their communities and their level of education or their ethnic history can help employers adapt their approach to engage them in mental health services.
These evaluations are particularly important for companies that use suppliers for well-being and mental health services. With data, companies can keep their suppliers responsible for the results. For example, data can show how sellers reach members and if they reach those who need help most.
3) Negotiate prices with better information
The reimbursement strategies are of the utmost importance. The negotiation of better prices in advance will have significant implications for the affordability of members, population health, growth and profitability.
There are four aspects for the analysis of the prices that each employer should consider before negotiating the contracts for health regime:
- REPRICING MEDICAR is the reduction base on gold discounts. It is an important point of data because it is the common language that payers, suppliers and consultants use.
- Machine readable files (MRF) – The transparency of the final coverage rule requires that these files make information on the prices of health care more accessible. Note that the massive size of these files can be difficult to work, and health plans and suppliers can use different formats, which makes them difficult to compare them. However, they offer a great promise and should be essential in any price analysis.
- Refund of reimbursement – References at the market level that use paid complaints are the best resource to tell employers what happened. This real data is a good option to assess the accuracy of the MRF.
- Advanced analytical reports – Employers must be able to draw all the information in an environment where they can model it. Here, they can compare current use and expenses with competitive data points or assess the implementation of their contracts.
If an employer knows which diagnostic groups (DRG) lead to costs, that is to say powerful information when negotiating prices. These facts – as well as admissions and complaints – allow a more complete image and the ability to monitor changes over time.
Data sophistication is essential to reduce costs
In the three areas, one or two data sources are not sufficient to take up the challenge of the costs of health services. Companies should discover the trends affecting their members using a robust set of aggregated and aggregated data sources. Data -based strategies will require a level of data sophistication higher than ever, but cost savings and high -quality care protection are worth their effort and investment.
Photo: Lerbank, Getty Images
Marcy Tatsch is executive vice-president and managing director of Troven, a platform that includes solutions on health information (health care analysis) and Marketscan (real evidence). Previously at Merative, she also directed Cúram, our global solution to help government agencies transform the benefit of benefits. Before joining Merative, she held various management positions of McKesson and Change Healthcare, manager of companies that served hospitals and pharmacies with platform, financial and analytical solutions.
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