Employers

At the 2023 Greater Philadelphia Business Coalition on Health annual conference, a panel of employers shared their advice on incorporating the principles of value into health benefits.

At the 2023 Greater Philadelphia Business Coalition on Health, panelists described the ways their organizations are promoting access to primary care in hopes that it can be part of the progress toward achieving the Quadruple Aim of lower costs, better outcomes, patient satisfaction, and clinician experience.

Kicking off the 2023 Greater Philadelphia Business Coalition on Health annual conference, Mark Fendrick, MD, of the University of Michigan, delivered a keynote exhorting the audience of employers and payers to implement the principles of value-based insurance design (VBID) in order to improve individual and population health and drive toward equity.

Coverage from the Greater Philadelphia Business Coalition on Health (GPBCH) daylong Oncology Management Summit, held April 4, 2023.

Oncology has been an easy area for employers to adopt biosimilars because of the rising costs in the space, said Margaret Rehayem, vice president, National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions. Now that multiple adalimumab (Humira) biosimilars are hitting the US market, employers should take a step back to review their current strategy around the drug.

Rebates remain very attractive for many employers, but they should push back on the reliance on rebates that may be preventing biosimilars from being added to formularies, said Margaret Rehayem, vice president, National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions.

While employers fall on a spectrum when it comes to knowledge and understanding of biosimilars, there does remain a need to educate them, as well as for them to educate their employees, said Margaret Rehayem, vice president, National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions.

Equity has to be made front and center in conversations about value assessment, otherwise all stakeholders will continue waiting for someone else to make the first move, said one panelist at the Value-Based Insurance Design Summit.

Insured lower-wage employees had lower prevalence of mental health conditions but greater severity, with more hospital admissions and emergency department visits than high-wage employees.

A new resource from the National Alliance of Healthcare Purchaser Coalitions aims to help plan sponsors adopt biosimilars into their pharmacy benefit plans.

Virtual care not only means saved time and costs for employees, but improvements to employers' bottom lines, through more proactive management of health concerns, notes UCM Digital Health CEO and co-founder Keith Algozzine.

The first of at least 8 adalimumab biosimilars has finally launched in the United States after being kept off the market for years due to settlement agreements with the maker of the reference product, Humira.

The quest to deliver better cancer care—with better outcomes and patient experience—is not a one-size-fits-all journey, as seen in panels during the Community Oncology Alliance (COA) Payer Exchange Summit, held in Tyson’s Corner, Virginia.

Inactive occupational status and low educational level were associated with pain, late disease onset, and greater number of affected areas in patients with hidradenitis suppurativa.

It can be hard to think about the bigger picture while in the middle of a crisis, but providers and employers should use this opportunity to work together on new and alternative models of care delivery and financing that directly affect cost, outcomes, and experience.

A majority of patients with moderate or severe atopic dermatitis (AD) reported moderate-to-high negative impacts on quality of life.

Imposing a surcharge on unvaccinated employees will require employers to think through legal and policy implications.

Marking Mental Health Awareness month, stakeholders involved in the delivery of behavioral health care services discuss current efforts underway—spearheaded by the novel 988 emergency hotline—to address the growing mental health crisis.

Lower-salary employees in high-deductible health plans underutilize outpatient care and overutilize emergency departments.

Representatives from employers, pharmacy benefit managers, and others discussed methods of improving pharmacy access and affordability in health plans.

Key opinion leaders addressed cost, accessibility, and other barriers limiting use of comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP), and how employers can help drive preventive care and precision medicine through CGP.

Findings of a survey of large employers indicate that utilization management tools are ineffective in controlling health care costs for employees and may lead to barriers to treatment.

Survey results demonstrate an opportunity to incorporate good practices for high-deductible health plans that can help enrollees maximize value and better navigate their benefits and treatment options.