Medical stop-loss insurance's popularity is on the rise as more employers look to an array of tools to protect themselves from unexpected health insurance costs.

A white paper produced by insurer QBE Solutions notes that the percentage of self-insured employers that have stop-loss coverage has risen from less than 50 percent in 2000 to 60 percent today. Medical stop-loss coverage protects self-insured plans from unexpectedly high claims.

The paper concludes that several key factors are driving the increase:

• Ongoing cost increases in health insurance;

• Major insurance claims are higher than they once were;

• The complexities of compliance with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) has raised concerns among self-insured plan sponsors about unexpected costs.

Small employers are moving to stop-loss and doing so in groups that offer them many of the same advantages that enterprise employers derive from stop-loss coverage, the paper says.