Aetna: CDHC Lowers Costs, Improves Care
Aetna compared six years of experience for 2.2 million Aetna members in traditional coverage and 400,000 in a HealthFund CDH plan. Its press release says:
The results show that Aetna HealthFund members are seeking increased levels of chronic and preventive care, using generic drugs more often and accessing online tools and information at higher rates than PPO members, while experiencing lower annualized medical cost increases. Importantly, this year's results also show that Aetna HealthFund members had lower emergency room use than PPO members, suggesting that members are becoming better informed about where to access health care.
It also found:
- For full replacement HRA and HSA plans, employers saved $21 million per 10,000 members over the five year period.
- For employers who offer Aetna HealthFund plans as an option, they experienced savings of $7 million per 10,000 members over the five year period.
- For employers who offer Aetna HealthFund plans as an option and implemented the strategies that Aetna identified as best-in-class, they achieved savings of $23 million per 10,000 members over the five year period
On all measures of consumer behavior HealthFund enrollees meet or exceed that of traditional enrollees, but also had 10% lower utilization of primary care physicians and 15% lower use of specialists, and seek preventive care and use consumer tools and information at a greater rate than PPO members.
$7 million dollar savings per 10,000 insureds over 5 years is very low savings with HSA coverage. That’s only $140 a year savings per insured. The average cost for employer based health insurance is $400 a year for single coverage. HSA insurance for a 30-year-old male is only $60 a month in most states. The average savings should be more like $2,000 a year per employee, [plus] the tax savings because their is no payroll tax on employer HSA deposits. $2,000 X 10,000 employees = $20,000,000 per year or $100,000,000 over 5 years.
But that’s the difference between dangerous non-portable employer-based health insurance and the security of low cost portable HSA “individual insurance.” Aetna sure did a good job with their so-called statistics to make HSAs look less attractive than they really are.
Very interesting observation, Ron. I don’t think Aetna is even in the individual market.
That’s enough Aetna bashing. Aetna has been one of the most innovative companies in pushing the limits of consumer driven health care. We owe them a debt of gratitude.
Ron, you misunderstood the bullet. The $7 million savings applied to employers who offered HSAs as an option. So, some large portion of the group was not in HSAs, very likely 75% or so. Yet the WHOLE group still saved money. The savings of the HSA enrollees is spread over the whole group.
I think Aetna was also helpful in persuading the Treasury to make rulings favorable to HSA expansion.
Aetna Ceo Ron Williams has been very good on promoting CDHC in Congressional testimony and in public speeches.