Today, more and more companies are financing their own healthcare plans as the cost of fully-funded health insurance becomes increasingly exorbitant. Switching to a self-funded health plan can significantly reduce the company’s costs while delivering more tailored healthcare services to employees and their beneficiaries.
However, companies have to take on a level of risk when they decide to fund their own health insurance. Depending on the healthcare needs of individual staff, a company might have to contend with increased expenses from medical and pharmaceutical bills. Given the rise in healthcare costs, the option to fund employees’ health benefits might seem like a risky prospect for some employers.
However, there are strategies that companies can and should employ to help save on healthcare costs. These strategies involve working with employees to improve their overall wellness long-term. In the following sections, we give examples of such strategies and why they’re beneficial from a financial and personnel standpoint.
Implementing Lifestyle Management Programs
On an individual level, your healthcare costs spike when you’re diagnosed with a chronic illness (e.g. diabetes, hypertension, cardiovascular disease) for example, suffer from huge economic loss every year due to chronic diseases.
However, the risk of developing a chronic condition can be greatly reduced with healthy lifestyle changes. Implementing outreach programs that encourage employees to take up regular exercise and eat more balanced diets can go a long way in increasing wellness.
By lowering chronic disease risk among employees, companies also prevent incurring more healthcare costs in the future. Implementing a lifestyle management program that emphasizes employees’ wellness can also present other advantages. For example, it can incentivize workers to perform better and reduce absenteeism.
Establishing Disease Management Programs
For companies with employees who already have a chronic condition, implementing a disease management program can be incredibly beneficial. Disease management programs are all about encouraging your employees to take better care of themselves. Companies can do this by increasing employees’ access to low-cost generic medication and incentivizing them to attend periodic appointments with their healthcare provider.
In some cities, the advent of chronic diseases among citizens drives up healthcare costs every year. As a company, you can help stop the progression of chronic disease among your staff by implementing a disease management program. Not only will this improve the lives of your employees, but it will create savings in your company’s annual healthcare expenses.
Investing In Comprehensive Biometric Health Screenings
As part of your company’s commitment to helping employees avoid or manage chronic disease, one of the best things you can do is adopt annual biometric screenings. Health screenings measure chronic disease risk factors such as weight, cholesterol, blood pressure, and nutrition. Your employees can then review the results with their doctors and come up with an action plan to improve their health status.
The data you collect from biometric screenings will also help your company anticipate a potential increase in healthcare costs, and help you adjust your existing lifestyle and disease management programs accordingly.
If you want to learn more about how you can reduce healthcare costs or how to implement a self-funded health plan, visit National Insurance Partners Inc.