Kevin Ronneberg, MD

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Think of a recent consumer experience that you’ve had and odds are it is not related to your use of the healthcare system or related or your health insurance. More often than not, we cite examples from the retail, banking, hospitality or travel industry where elements of transparency, convenience, and reliability combine to generate a memorable and lovable experience. Surrounded by these examples every day, consumers have come to expect the same level of experience in all aspects of their life including healthcare.

Our members also tell us this. Ultimately, they are seeking our help in making their experience simple and affordable. This is no small task. However, we have taken it on with a focus to develop trust, engagement, and activation with those who use our health plan.

An easy-to-navigate web page and mobile experience that provides personalized information (easy access to information about current spend against deductible and OOP limits, finding a high-quality, in-network provider, and more affordable along with access to EOBs) is table stakes these days. Creating relatable, relevant ,and timely communication and tools that demonstrate the value of a health plan to the consumer is where the opportunity lies.

Two key ways to enhance experience are making cost and quality information easily accessible and supporting coordination and navigation of care through consumer personalization and empowerment.

Who enjoys getting a colonoscopy? The idea of prepping for and having the test is a barrier to even going to have a physical at a certain age. In an effort to enhance colorectal cancer screening (CRC) rates, we identified individuals not up to date with screening recommendations who also had no primary care visits in the prior year where a recommendation for screening might occur.

10 Ways to Improve the Patient Experience

Understanding these individuals were not engaging with the care system and knowing a big barrier to CRC screening is fear of colonoscopy, we mailed FIT kits-a home based screening test for CRC-to over 30,000 members along with information on CRC screening and the value of establishing a primary care relationship. The communication was timely and relevant to the audience as just over 24% completed the test and returned the kits. Those with positive findings were all referred for further assessment and screening leading, in some cases, to early cancer diagnoses or identification of polyps requiring more frequent monitoring. Personalizing the campaign increased CRC screening and engaged members with primary care.

Healthcare can be complicated, right? Shopping for prescriptions shouldn’t be. Recently, we launched a pharmacy price transparency tool in our web and mobile experience that provides pricing at any pharmacy. Through a real time benefit check, a consumer can see their OOP cost and plan liability for individual drugs or total cost for all of their prescriptions at a given pharmacy. If a lower cost pharmacy is nearby, they can initiate a transfer of prescriptions with the push of one button.

This has helped save countless dollars for consumers and plan sponsors. This same capability is being piloted in our providers offices to allow the prescriber to see and share with their patient what the real drug costs are based on negotiated rates and current benefit status.

Communications and plan tools must feel relevant and demonstrate value to the consumer if we wish to gain trust and deliver on our members expectations of a simple and affordable experience.

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More than 100 million U.S. adults are now living with diabetes or prediabetes, 

 by the CDC. While the report indicates some progress in fighting diabetes, this is still a staggering figure, and it’s our job as healthcare executives to address it.

But how should we? Is more research needed? Better management? More preventive measures?

, our answer has been all of the above. I’m sure many of you would agree.

As an integrated organization, we’re leveraging our care delivery, healthcare financing and research institute together to fuel change. There’s no one silver bullet. But, here are a few of the ways we are seeing progress.  

Just last year, we were part of a team that helped bring the 

first version of an artificial pancreas to market

. This device is a closed-loop system that automatically delivers insulin to people with type 1 diabetes based on their blood sugar levels. The 

, which is part of HealthPartners Institute, was one of 10 sites in the world to conduct critical research on the use of this technology.

This type of research is happening all around the country, and is vital to helping people with diabetes live healthier, more productive lives. Further, we know that proper management can significantly reduce cost of care.

We’re also exploring new ways to help members and patients with diabetes achieve better outcomes. This work is going beyond a traditional focus on quality measures and identifying where else we can have an impact on quality of life.

For example, we know there is a strong relationship between 

. Among our members with diabetes, the rate of well controlled blood sugars is 10% higher for those who have had a dental visit compared to those with no dental visit.

Just this month, we launched a personalized outreach campaign to members with diabetes who have both medical and dental coverage with us. We’re letting them know more about the relationship between healthy teeth and gums and diabetes, and about their specific dental benefits.  

3. Reframing how we think about prevention

In our commercial health plan members, more than 20% who are prediabetic are diagnosed with diabetes in the following three years. That’s why we’re directly addressing health outside our clinic walls.

We have convened communities in a multisector collaboration at four levels: healthy environment, outreach, programs, and clinics. An example of this approach is 

, a community-wide initiative with a long-term strategy to “make it easy, fun, and popular to eat better and move more.”

Facets of the program include robust school wellness policies; healthier food shelves, cafeterias and concessions, and open gyms. A key program is the School Challenge, inspiring kids to eat fruits and vegetables. Now going into its seventh year, the classroom-based program includes more than 60 schools and reaches more than 22,000 students annually.

As the CDC acknowledged, we’ve made progress. We’re improving how we address people who have developed risk factors and have developed disease. We need to continue to do that, while at the same time, find ways of providing treatments and interventions to help those with diabetes live healthier lives.

In the long run the real win is primary prevention. What can we do to help people prevent developing risk factors and ultimately diabetes? It’s not easy, but it’s the long view and where we will find the best outcomes and affordability.  

 editorial advisor and vice president and associate medical director, Health Initiatives, at 

HealthPartners’ vice president and associate medical director shares how the integrated organization is looking beyond traditional approaches to curb diabetes.

Three New Ways One Integrated Health Organization is Fighting Diabetes

	“Integration” is a frequently used buzzword in healthcare. I come across it everywhere, from casual talks with colleagues to major research studies.

	Many agree that integration is a path to improve consumer experience. But it’s the definition and implementation of integration that often leaves us in ambiguity.

	At HealthPartners, integration means we provide healthcare financing through our health plan and healthcare delivery through our hospitals and clinics. Our vast engagement and data analytics provide a better understanding of our consumer’s values and preferences, and allow us to deliver a more seamless and consumer-centric experience.

	Here are three ways HealthPartners has leveraged integration to develop consumer-centric solutions:

	Orthopedics is one of the highest contributors to employer’s healthcare costs. To address this, our health plan and care delivery system created a different model of care. This Spine Care Model pairs up patients and health plan members considering surgery with a medical spine care specialist. They discuss surgery and other less invasive, yet effective, treatment, like physician directed physical therapy. The model also provides chiropractic care embedded in primary care and walk-in acute injury clinics. This integrated model is saving our patients and plan members time and money.

	Being on an incorrect medication dose or an unhealthy mix of medications is harmful and costly to our members and patients and is costly to our healthcare system.

	Our Medication Therapy Management program identifies health plan members and care delivery patients at risk of having a problem with their medicines. We offer these members and patients free counseling at one of our 150 HealthPartners and Park Nicollet clinics or pharmacies, or by phone. By helping health plan members manage their medications using our care delivery system, we’ve seen an annual savings of about $1,100 per member. That number jumps to $4,500 for a member with a chronic illness.

	Our Healthy Beginnings program is another example of our health plan and care system working together to solve complex issues. Alcohol, tobacco and other drug use during pregnancy is the leading cause of premature birth and mental and physical problems in children. It causes costly NICU stays and lifelong health problems.

	The program screens every woman who sees us at our HealthPartners or Park Nicollet clinics for pregnancy care. Patients at risk work with a social worker or nurse to set and achieve realistic goals to avoid drugs and alcohol. Most care delivery systems don’t provide these services due their non-billable nature. Most plans don’t have the clinical resources to execute it. We’re fortunate to have grant support and health plan funding to power this program. We operate it through a strong partnership between our health plan’s Healthy Pregnancy case managers, and the clinic Healthy Beginnings teams. This program helps avoid costly NICU stays, and more importantly, gives babies a healthy and bright start.

	These programs highlight a few ways HealthPartners health plan and care delivery system work together to put our consumers at the center. Our results show our members and patients are saving time and money while having a better customer experience.

	We have more to do. As our customers come to expect and value this integration, affordability will be their number one demand. We’ll need to think differently about our existing care models, and offer more convenient options. Above all, we’ll need to earn our consumers’ trust by showing the true value of integrated models of care.

Kevin Ronneberg, MD, is vice president Health Initiatives and associate medical director, at 

Here are three ways HealthPartners’ health plan and care delivery system work together to save customers time and money and improve their experience.

Author | Kevin Ronneberg, MD

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