Employees Wrongly Think 'You Get What You Pay For' in H...(ces in employer-sponsored benefit and we...),Health

programs and are skeptical of employer efforts to steer them either

toward or away from a particular program or provider.

-- Monetary incentives alone won't get employees to participate in

VBBD programs. Programs need to be combined with peer persuasion and

management support to encourage both initial and ongoing participation.

-- Employee awareness and understanding of existing benefit programs is

generally low and misinformation from the "grapevine" adds to

this confusion.

-- Employees want to play an active role in managing their health, but

motivation to act is hindered by work/life balance, money and

understanding or awareness.

-- Employees need to see that incentives are in place because employers

really do care about their health. They also want to see that the

incentives make sense.

Value-Based Benefit Design

Value-Based Benefit Design entails reducing the cost of effective health care providers, services, procedures, treatments or drugs. For example, employers may lower the cost of diabetes medications to encourage diabetic employees to regularly take their prescribed medications, as not taking prescribed medications can lead to critical events and costly hospitalizations. A lower employee cost for effective drugs yields higher quality of care and a wise investment for employees and employers. The same can be done for doctors and hospitals. Lowering employee co-pays for doctors and hospitals that have obtained higher quality outcomes encourages visits to those better performing, more efficient providers. The payoff comes in the form of healthier employees, with fewer tests, fewer complications from surgery and fewer hospital readmissions. To offset the lowered employee costs, employers can raise costs for lower quality, less effective providers, services, procedures, treat
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