Crossing the ‘episode of care’ road

(AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)

Large self-insured employers spend hundreds of billions of dollars annually on health benefits struggle to manage trend and reduce employee health risk. Consultants and carriers provide uninspiring choices from cost shifting to adoption of private exchanges.

Despite the outlay of billions only two things are certain for employers—employee engagement declines and administrative expenses increase. With national health expenditures eclipsing 17 percent of the gross domestic product, new players or vendors are flooding the market with products, technologies, and services with a promise to employers to reverse the slide of employee engagement and the escalation of health care costs.  While some industry estimates project 30 percent of health care cost as waste, health care payers through evidence-based approaches must sort through these options.