Archive | July, 2013

Walgreens Clinic Rebranding Is More Than A Name Change

July 30, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 2 Comments

As I talked about in my post about Walgreens and innovation, Walgreens has renamed their TakeCare Clinics to Healthcare Clinics at some locations.  This is more than just a meaningless name change.  This is the beginning of a business model change.  This is the shift from acute care to ongoing chronic disease management.  This is a big move that changes their place in the healthcare value chain.

It’s part of the overall strategy that has pulled them into the ACO space.

It will be interesting to see if CVS Caremark and their MinuteClinics follow them.  CVS Caremark already announced a different strategy in terms of providing advocates.  If I were them, I would jump fully into the remote monitoring / mHealth space and provide chronic disease management from a remote basis.  I think this would be different and innovative.

Walgreens Healthcare Clinics

Books / Articles, Care Management, Healthcare, Innovation, Leadership, mHealth, PBM / Pharmacy, Value Propositions
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Who Do Consumers Expect To Help Them Navigate The Exchanges?

July 29, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 1 Comment

As part of Health Reform, we’re going to have millions of people who are new to healthcare and will need a lot of help in figuring out what to do.  With that, the government is creating thousands of navigators to help.

The question is who will these “navigators”, “assisters”, and “counselors” be.  Some will work for the government.  Some will work for non-profits, but I was surprised to see CVS Caremark jump into this space.  It makes a ton of sense.  Certainly, many of these people are going to pharmacies for OTCs or paying cash for some medications, and we certainly saw opportunities in the early Medicare Part D days where there were opportunities for the retail pharmacies to help consumers.

Their survey says 74% of people are familiar with the ACA (i.e., Health Reform).  While that might be true, the Kaiser Family Foundation research shows that only 12% of the uninsured know something (or more) about health exchanges.  That means there is a huge effort needed in a very short time frame.

KFF Health Reform

Healthcare

Treadmills Improve Medical Work

July 27, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 0 Comments

This is an interesting article talking about how accuracy improved while walking on a treadmill versus sitting or standing.  I think this is another great reason to sit less (in case the fact that sitting kills you wasn’t enough).  

Fidler and Levine’s 2008 paper documented that reviewers who walked while reading cross-sectional CT scans had a 99% rate of detecting lesions with significant clinical importance, compared to 88.9% for reviewers who sat.

The challenge of course is how to incorporate these treadmills into the workplace without causing any type of risk or having people misuse them.  I can see meeting rooms with a group of treadmills for walking meetings.  I’ve seen companies with several treadmill desks that people can use for conference calls or periods of time when they are focused on a task that can be conducted on a treadmill desk.

This will require some education about what activities can be done.  What speed to use the treadmills at without losing accuracy or getting all sweaty.  Perhaps with increased focus on wellness this will takeoff in more companies.  

Healthcare
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53% Of Employers Plan To Use Disincentives

July 22, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 0 Comments

I found this really interesting in an article in Employee Benefits News (Employers take closer look at financial disincentives by Gililan Roberts – July 2013).  This stat is from an Aon Hewitt survey which showed that while only 5% of employers use disincentives today there are 53% which plan to begin doing so in the next 3-5 years.

This shouldn’t be a big incentives as I think most people now know that loss aversion is much more powerful than a general incentives (i.e., I’d rather not lose money, but I’m less motivated to get money.)  [See also an older study on financial incentives and weight loss.]

For example, in a recent program that I’m involved with, we’re seeing slower uptake then I’d like with $1,000 in incentives on the line.  My suggestion the other day was to send an e-mail to everyone saying “Thanks For Your $1,000 Donation To Our Corporate Budget”.  Somehow, I suspect a lot of people might open that e-mail and take action after realizing that they’re just giving $1,000 to the company by not taking any action.

There is often lots of discussion about using a carrot or a stick for incentives.  My favorite image is the frozen carrot as in there has to be some perceived incentives (positive reinforcement) but if no action is taken then there needs to be a downside (disincentive).

With the huge jump in wellness programs, incentives are going to be a popular topic.  Additionally, with Health Reform allowing for 30% of healthcare premiums to be tied to behaviors and outcomes, you’re going to see a lot of companies taking actions.

What was a surprise to me in this article was the strategy to use disincentives in the 3rd year of a program.  The article spoke several times about people getting used to the positive incentive and taking it for granted so that there was a need to nudge them to do more.

That reminds me of conversations I’ve had with employers talking about behavior change and incentives.  My suggestion was to look at a 3-year plan moving from:

  • Year One: Provide an incentive for taking an action (e.g., completing an HRA)
  • Year Two: Provide an incentive based on participation (e.g., talking to a disease management nurse or logging your steps)
  • Year Three: Provide an incentive tied to outcomes or behavior change (e.g., stopped smoking, averaged 10,000 steps a day, dropped BMI below 30)

It seems like I need to make Year Four into changing from incentive to penalty for not changing behavior or not doing something that’s recognized as critical to improving health, outcomes, and ultimately cost containment.

The other point that they brought up in the article is the transition from the employee to the spouse which could be another Year Four option.  The article quotes the VP of Product from HCSC saying that spouses often cost more than the employee to insure.

Cyndy Nayer, a value-based wellness consultant, is quoted in the story several times.  She says that “employers can get a 6%-10% and maybe even 18%-20% increase in engagement with incentives”.  For those of us focused on engagement, those are big numbers.

Healthcare

Did You Know? Chronic Kidney Disease (#CKD) From The National Kidney Foundation

July 19, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 0 Comments

I was reading a document from the National Kidney Foundation (NKF) the other day.  Some of the facts jumped out at me.  I thought I’d share them.

  • 83,000 people are on the waiting list for a kidney transplant
  • 1 person dies every 2 hours while waiting for a kidney transplant
  • 26M Americans (1 in 9 adults) have chronic kidney disease (CKD) and most don’t know it
  • 367,000 people depend on dialysis for survival

It also reinforced some things that many people may know:

  • Once kidneys fail, patients need a transplant of dialysis to survive
  • People with diabetes, high blood pressure, or a family history of these conditions are at risk for CKD
  • African Americans, Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans, and the elderly are at increased risk

You can also find more information about CKD from the CDC.

There was an article this week in the NY Times about this silent killer.  Here’s a paragraph from there.

Only 1 percent of participants with no lifestyle-related risk factors developed protein in their urine, an early indicator of kidney damage, while 13 percent of those with three unhealthy factors developed the condition, known medically as proteinuria. Obesity alone doubled a person’s risk of developing kidney disease; an unhealthy diet raised the risk even when weight and other lifestyle factors were taken into account.

Books / Articles, Care Management, Healthcare, Research
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Obese Scouts (And Leaders) Told To Stay Away

July 18, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 0 Comments

Did you catch the story the other day that kids and adults that had a BMI of over 40 were told they couldn’t come to the annual Boy Scout Jamboree? And those that had a BMI of between 32 and 39.9 had to submit documentation that they could attend.

What do you think about that?

If you look at the adult US statistics, this would represent about 30%+ of the population. (United HealthGroup report: “United States of Diabetes“)

This is one story where I’m sure there’s a lot that we’d want to know. In Time, they talk about the fact that they published the restrictions two years ago. This would have allowed people time to improve their BMI. But, jumping from 40 to 31 might be too big of a jump in two years for some people to do in a healthy way.

If I were developing this type of program for a company, I’d expect to answer these questions:

  • What did you do to support the scouts and leaders in losing weight? Did you give them a coach? A registered dietician?
  • Did you create a culture of health? What types of foods are at boy scout meetings?
  • Is there a reasonable alternative for the obese scouts to get a similar experience if clinically appropriate?

Obviously, this isn’t a work environment so the rules are different. On the one hand, congrats to them for being brave enough to take this topic on and try to encourage scouts and leaders to have a healthy weight. On the other hand, they need to make sure they do this in a way that doesn’t shame these people and need to make sure they support their weight loss.

But, don’t be fooled. The world is going to continue to move this way. Obesity is too big of a driver of healthcare costs and other presenteeism and absenteeism impacts.

Just look at Japan…(source)

Under a national law that came into effect two months ago, companies and local governments must now measure the waistlines of Japanese people between the ages of 40 and 74 as part of their annual checkups. That represents more than 56 million waistlines, or about 44 percent of the entire population.

Those exceeding government limits — 33.5 inches for men and 35.4 inches for women, which are identical to thresholds established in 2005 for Japan by the International Diabetes Federation as an easy guideline for identifying health risks — and having a weight-related ailment will be given dieting guidance if after three months they do not lose weight. If necessary, those people will be steered toward further re-education after six more months.

To reach its goals of shrinking the overweight population by 10 percent over the next four years and 25 percent over the next seven years, the government will impose financial penalties on companies and local governments that fail to meet specific targets. The country’s Ministry of Health argues that the campaign will keep the spread of diseases like diabetes and strokes in check.

Books / Articles, exercise, Healthcare, Press, Words Matter
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CarePass, Another Aetna Innovation – What’s Your Healthy?

July 10, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 5 Comments

Have you seen the new “What’s Your Healthy?” campaign?  Here’s a few shots.

BTW – My healthy is keeping up with my kids in sports and moving down a belt notch.

Image

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As many of you know, I consider Walgreens and Aetna to be two of the most innovative healthcare companies today (out of the big, established players).  [And, full disclosure, I own stock in both.]  I’ve talked about Walgreens (see Walgreens post on innovation) several times along with Aetna (see Healthagen post).

That being said, the new campaign along with the press caught my attention.  I was glad that I was able to get some time with Martha Wofford who is the VP and head of CarePass.

“We want to make it easier for everyone to engage in their health and hopefully shift from thinking about health care to taking care of their health,” said Martha L. Wofford, vice president and head of CarePass from Aetna. “CarePass helps consumers connect different pieces of health data to create a fuller, more personalized picture of their health.”

I spent some time talking with Martha and team about their initiative.  Here’s some highlights that stuck out to me.

  • There use of goals was really easy and intuitive.  If you log-in to the CarePass site and get started, you have 3 options or you can create your own (see below).  We spent some time talking about the importance of making these relevant to the individual not focusing on “healthcare goals” like adherence or lowering you blood sugar.  Most of us don’t think that way.  As they described them, they picked “motivation centric goals”.
    Aetna Carepass goals
  • I was also really interested in how they picked which apps to recommend.  There are so many out there, and many of you know that I’ve been fascinated by the concept of curating apps or prescribing apps to people.  They had a nice, simple process:
    • Which apps are most popular?
    • Does the app have “breadth”?  (i.e., national applicability)
    • They also spent more time pre-screening apps which collect PHI to understand them before listing them on the site.
    • They’re using the consumers goals to recommend apps to them.
  • The other big question I had is why do this.  It certain helps build the Aetna brand over time, but there’s not direct path to revenue (that I see).  They described their efforts as “supporting the healthcare journey” through connected data.  Ultimately, it’s about making Aetna a preferred consumer brand which may be very relevant in the individual market and exchange world in the not too distant future.
  • I like the idea of companies being “app agnostic” as I call it.  Walgreens is doing this.  Aetna is doing this.  I plan on doing this in my day job.  This allows the consumer to pick the app that works for them and as long as the data is normalized (or can be normalized) and the app provides some type of open API (application programming interface) it’s much easier to integrate with.
  • We talked a little about what’s next.  Metabolic syndrome is something they brought up.  This is something that Aetna’s been talking about in several forums for a while now.  They launched a new offering earlier this year.  (I still hate the term metabolic syndrome from a consumer perspective, but it seems to be sticking in the healthcare community.)
  • We also talked about new goals to come around smoking cessation, medication, and stress.
  • Another discussion I have with lots of people is how this data gets used.  (see a good article about what’s next for QuantifiedSelf)  I personally really want to see my data pushed to the care management team to monitor and send me information.  (Eat this not that type of suggestions)  Martha talked about how the data belongs to the member and they have to choose to push it to the coach.  She also talked about how they’re integrating with their PHR (Personal Health Record) first and then looking at others.  (see old interview with ActiveHealth)

In summary, CarePass is a nice additional to your #QuantifiedSelf toolkit.  As you can see from the screenshots below, the GUI (graphic user interface) is simple.  It’s well designed.  Integration with your apps is easy.  It provides you with goals and motivation.  They help you navigate the app world.  And, it helps you bring together data from multiple sources.  Once it can pull in all my Rx, medical and lab data along with my HRA data and my device data, it will be really cool!  But, I know that I’m a minority in that effort.  I’m really intrigued by the lifestyle questions they ask and wonder how those will ultimately personalize my experience.

Carepass lifestyle questions Carepass dashboard

So, what apps do they share?  Here’s a screenshot, but you really should log-in and try the site and see the full list.  It’s simple and worth the effort.

Carepass apps

As an added bonus, I’m adding a presentation I gave with Aetna at the Care Continuum Alliance two years ago.  I was searching for my past interviews with Aetna people and found this online so I added it to SlideShare and put it here.

Books / Articles, Care Management, Consumerism, Healthcare, Innovation, Leadership, Managed Care, Marketing / Communications, mHealth, Press, Research, Technology, Value Propositions
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Prescribing An App vs. An Rx – Why Are People Surprised?

July 7, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 1 Comment

A staggering 90 percent of chronic patients in the US would accept a mobile app prescription from their physician, as opposed to only 66 percent willing to accept a prescription of medication, according to a recent survey from health communications firm Digitas Health.  (source)

Is this surprising to anyone?

I don’t think it should be…and here’s why:

  1. In general, most apps don’t cost anything while prescriptions generally do.
  2. I don’t know of any apps with side effects.
  3. It’s unlikely that your app will have a negative interaction with another app (like a drug-drug interaction).  It may give you conflicting information, but that’s about it.
  4. You don’t have to wait to get your app.  You can probably download it while you’re at the physician’s office.  A prescription can take time to get either waiting in line, waiting for it to get filled, or sending it in through the mail.
  5. You don’t have to refill your app.  You may have to update it every once in a while, but it tells you when and all you have to do is press a button.

Of course, most (all) apps won’t have the same likelihood as Rxs in improving your health.  Of course, Rxs only work if people take them…which they don’t.

Still surprised?

Books / Articles, Healthcare, mHealth, Research, Technology, Value Propositions

More CDHPs Are Coming – Is That A Good Thing?

July 3, 2013 by George Van Antwerp 0 Comments

I think we all see it coming.  It’s a tidal wave of responsibility being pushed from the employer to us the individual.  On paper, this seems like a great thing since 75%+ of healthcare costs are driven by personal behaviors.  On the other hand, this means we actually have to understand the healthcare system and how to make decisions.

Here’s the abstract from a recent Health Affairs article:

Consumer-directed health plans (CDHPs) are designed to make employees more cost- and health-conscious by exposing them more directly to the costs of their care, which should lower demand for care and, in turn, control premium growth. These features have made consumer-directed plans increasingly attractive to employers. We explored effects of consumer-directed health plans on health care and preventive care use, using data from two large employers—one that adopted a CDHP in 2007 and another with no CDHP. Our study had mixed results relative to expectations. After four years under the CDHP, there were 0.26 fewer physician office visits per enrollee per year and 0.85 fewer prescriptions filled, but there were 0.018 more emergency department visits. Also, the likelihood of receiving recommended cancer screenings was lower under the CDHP after one year and, even after recovering somewhat, still lower than baseline at the study’s conclusion. If CDHPs succeed in getting people to make more cost-sensitive decisions, plan sponsors will have to design plans to incentivize primary care and prevention and educate members about what the plan covers.

You can see some of the growth stats and concerns also in an American Medical News article.  But, as someone who’s live through it, there are a series of issues (all of which are addressable).

  1. Shifting first dollar payment to the individual also shifts a huge burden of time to the individual.  Which bills do I pay?  Which receipts do I send to the HSA?  Which to the HRA?  How much should I put in each account?  What’s the status of my payments?
  2. This only works if I understand my tradeoffs.  What should I be doing differently?  How could I have spent less money?
  3. It can create the wrong incentives.  My regular transactions like pharmacy seem to cost me a huge amount of money every month while my procedures seem very inexpensive.

My point here is that healthcare is like a balloon.  When you step on one area, it doesn’t eliminate the costs.  It simply shifts the costs.  Until we understand the macro-economic impacts of our short-term decisions, it’s unlikely that we’ll really change our path.  I see a huge shift happening and when the tidal wave pulls back it’s going to leave us with a huge Medicare bill in the future as people have put off preventative care only to have more issues in a decade.

Books / Articles, Care Management, Healthcare, Managed Care