The COVID pandemic has made the importance of
Individuals in poor overall health risk suboptimal outcomes from infection — and higher costs along the way. And it’s not only COVID that preys on chronic, underlying and undiagnosed medical conditions; from heart disease and diabetes to untreated mental illness, a lack of timely preventive care can increase the likelihood of more severe problems over time. Now, as self-funded employers seek to get spiraling
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Effective preventive care begins with an understanding of what’s needed, when. For a busy employee, the early signs of a developing problem can be easy to miss or ignore. For employers, though, the data captured in consumer-directed health plans such as FSAs, HSAs and HRAs can provide a 360-degree view of the individual’s health. Complemented with information available to them as payers, this makes it possible to guide the individual to more effective care. For example, an employee
To take this approach, however, self-funded employers will need to reevaluate the systems through which their CDH plans are provided. Today, these systems are typically siloed and disjointed, with multiple vendors connected only through a web page without the back-end data exchange or consistent front-end experience needed for a truly 360-degree approach to wellness. Employees find their consumer-directed benefits hard to use, so they’re less likely to use them — foregoing the opportunity for services and resources that might improve their physical and mental health. To provide a better benefits experience, self-funded employers need a more interconnected benefits stack, and CDH providers need a way to offer it.
Taking an API-first approach to benefits
Traditionally, CDH plans have been thought of and created as standalone products, rather than as elements of a larger ecosystem. For employees, this has meant a different login and user experience for each of these plans, making it difficult to gain a full understanding of their benefits or use them effectively — for example, by directing funds from an HSA to pay for a health insurance co-payment. The health plans and third-party administrators (TPAs) who package and offer these benefits to employers would like nothing better than to remove this friction, but the difficulty creating and maintaining integrations across systems makes it unfeasible.
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To enable a real-time exchange of data on the back end, and a seamless experience for employees on the front end, CDH providers need to transition from traditional monolithic development into a modern, API-first approach where products are built to be easily integrated with each other. Just as the API mentality has transformed software development across industries from e-commerce to travel to telecommunications over the past decade, an API-first approach to CDH systems will make it simple for health plan providers and TPAs to assemble benefits into any stack an employer wants, integrated from the user interface to the back end.
For the TPA, API-first development means being able to offer a unified platform and user experience rather than a portal into disparate and disjointed systems. For employers, seamless two-way data exchange across CDH plans enables the 360-degree visibility and insight needed to understand employees’ preventive health needs, guide them to the right resources, and lower overall costs. And for employees, a better experience makes it possible to access the right benefits at the right time to improve wellness and quality of life.
Today’s consumer-directed benefits can help employees manage their wellness more successfully while lowering out-of-pocket costs — but only if they’re provided in a way that’s easy to understand, navigate, and use. By the same token, a better-integrated, more flexible benefits stack can help employees achieve a healthier workforce while getting runaway healthcare expenses under control. An API-first approach to CDH plan software development will enable the modern benefits experience we need for the post-COVID world.
