Friday Five – Better Benefits Data is Foundational for Improved Health
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To have health insurance coverage in the U.S. is a key measure of healthcare access. Yet even with the national uninsured rate at an all-time low, 34% of Americans still avoid doctor’s appointments due to poor insurance coverage and high co-pays.
Another factor?
Confusion navigating healthcare benefits: Just 9% of employees know what important terms like coinsurance mean.
Making healthcare benefits easier to understand and use for consumers can go a long way in helping Americans access care more consistently. We spoke with insurtech company, Noyo (@NoyoHQ), the benefits data platform powering the future of modern benefits, to learn five reasons why improving data quality in payer and benefits administration systems is foundational to improved health in the U.S.
Empowered Consumers
A recent Noyo-commissioned Harris Poll found that 48% of employed Americans who have employer-sponsored insurance benefits have experienced frustration using them because they are hard to understand. Improving data quality in payer and ben-admin systems is a critical step in addressing this frustration because it prepares the data to be used in digital ways to educate consumers, such as with interactive tools within payer portals or apps that demystifies policy details.
Administrative Efficiency
Over $900 billion is lost to healthcare waste every year in the U.S., due in large part to a lack of transparency and coordination between providers and payers. Small discrepancies frequently lead to big problems, such as inaccurate bills, access-to-care issues, and coverage delays. When high-quality data is used to create bills, enroll members in coverage, or approve claims, those discrepancies are drastically reduced. The result is an increase in administrative efficiency for payers, providers, and consumers.
Clarity for Providers
Caring for patients can be challenging for providers when they don’t have transparency into what will be approved by a payer. Better benefits data from payer systems can help by delivering accurate policy information to ben-admins. In the future, easy access to quality data can be used to develop super apps for both providers and patients, where everything from which doctors are in network to what services are covered by a healthcare insurance policy is readily available and up-to-date in one place.
A Holistic View of the Individual
Clean, trusted data shared across previously disconnected systems opens the door to a new level of accuracy into member health. Similar to today’s social media algorithms, combining eligibility, enrollment, and clinical data will one day create a holistic view of the individual that can be accessed or shared across payers, providers, and other systems to help drive better health outcomes.
Interoperability and Integrations
Interoperability between healthcare systems only moves bad data faster if there isn’t first a step to clean and synchronize the data at the start. Better benefits data in payer and ben-admin systems – and available to patient consumers and others within the ecosystem – will ensure that the information can be used with confidence. Ultimately, the goal is to enable benefits and healthcare experiences to be as convenient and unified as consumers already expect (and receive) from other industries such as retail, hospitality, and finance, among others.
About Noyo
Noyo is the benefits data platform providing the modern data infrastructure to make frictionless employee benefits possible. Founded by leaders in benefits, insurance, and API technology, Noyo is the first company transforming the underlying infrastructure of the benefits and insurance industry through seamless digital connectivity. With Noyo, crucial benefits data is synchronized and made instantly available anywhere it’s needed, unlocking new possibilities for how benefits are designed and delivered and enhancing them for all. To learn more about how Noyo’s industry-leading technology is powering the next generation of employee benefits, visit www.noyo.com
ICYMI – Our other Friday Fives and Blog posts from HCNR’s Nurse Lauren.
