Wellness Incentives

Can incentives actually drive wellness? Why not? Why?

Incentives are powerful tools once you understand the healthcare consumer and how they react. Is the incentive a lower copay? Is it a free service? Lots of interesting models are going to come up. It has worked in other industries but can it work here.

I think a lot will depend on the segment of the market and what you are asking them to do. A old person (i.e., a MD worshipper) is unlikely to challenge their doctor and push for certain action. A younger person in good health (i.e., a Living for Today) is unlikely to respond to messaging about pre-screening and general check-ups.

Here are a couple of the things out there:

• Humana and Virgin worked together on an offering a while ago called Virgin Life Care.
• Cigna offers their Healthy Rewards program which is a series of discounts on gym members and other wellness programs.
• Marriott works with ActiveHealth (Aetna owned) to reduce copays in return for compliance (Value Based Formulary) .
• IncentOne is actually a services company focusing on the healthcare space.

Another model which will be interesting is existing companies like Maritz which do loyalty programs and incentive programs for other industries.  As they apply their skills to the healthcare market, it should allow this to take off faster.