Death, Taxes and Optum
The end of 2017 brings tidings of anything but great joy for health system executives. Consider what has happened in just the last 45 days:
- United/Optum acquired The Advisory Board and announced plans to acquire DaVita;
- CVS announced plans to acquire Aetna;
- Dignity announced a merger with CHI; and
- Advocate and Aurora announced plans to merge.
What is driving this unprecedented activity? The primacy of the commercially insured patient.
In short, dominant and entrenched market participants are trying to influence, or even control, the ways in which consumers access health care services. As the Medicare “silver tsunami” gains steam, there are fewer commercially insured patients today than there were yesterday, and high deductibles are making them postpone care. And now this:
United already employs more physicians than any other private organization in the world and owns more than 200 surgery centers; the acquisition of DaVita will add 300 physician clinics and more than 10,000 physicians.
CVS has over 9,500 pharmacies and 1,100 MinuteClinic locations, coupled with a robust customer loyalty program.
There are now 3 things that are certain in life for health system executives: death, taxes, and payers trying to prevent consumers from accessing care at hospitals and health systems.
Over the past year, I have met repeatedly with the C-suite of several of the largest health systems in the US to discuss and develop growth strategies in light of these monumental changes in the landscape. In every case, senior executives like you are inviting Trilliant back, in some cases the next day, to discuss the three ways a health system can impact patient acquisition:
- Physician Referral
- Employer Benefit Plan
- Consumer Choice
Trilliant was formed through the mergers of Aegis Health, Clariture Health and Expression Health Analytics. The combination of the three companies has resulted in one company with a unique value proposition: Intelligent Patient Acquisition.
Maybe you are concerned about growth and need to make an immediate impact on your new patient acquisition strategy. Or maybe you do not want to share your data with United/Optum via The Advisory Board. In either case, we should talk.