7 Best Ways Employers Can Control Their Employee's Healthcare Costs

Health isn't an unfamiliar term that has seen traction in recent years. But it holds a special mention when we focus on the competitive nature of a corporate world. Tight deadlines and untimely overwork have rattled the overall employee's wellbeing. It has introduced various lifestyle diseases that range from moderate to chronic among employees.

Worldwide employers are exploring solutions to lower health implications that come along with it. This raised other economic and occupational concerns where one such situation is controlling employee's healthcare costs.

Do you know that the solutions you have been providing to save your employees deteriorating health, actually cost you unnecessary bills?

Yes, you heard it right, according to a research by Transamerica, focusing on preventing chronic diseases can save you a $360 billion a year.

So, here I have mentioned some of the effective ways to get you on hold of your company's healthcare budgets.

But before that, let us know how you, as a leader, can play an essential role in fostering health at work.

Role Of Employers in Organizational Wellness

"If you want to gather honey, don't kick over the beehive." - Dale Carnegie

An employer's prime goal is to expand its business along with a loyal customer base. But to achieve such a feat, it isn't a Catch 22 for many. There is a fine line between your employee satisfaction and customer satisfaction.

A happy employee is a healthy employee, and any organization's success lies in the health of its workforce. Such a force develops a culture of mental, physical, and emotional wellness that contributes to the quality of the company's services.

Often employees give up on health checkups fretting about its expensive health bills. But when employers guide them with alternate and economic resources, it encourages them to prioritize their health, mitigating preventable health risks, promoting overall healthier work culture.

Being the decision-maker in the company, managers have a traditional role in implementing crucial policies and objectives. Helping their employees to reduce health care costs, marks a win-win strategy for everyone. So, an employer must nurture health at work to engage better and produce the organization's productive outputs.

7 Ways To Reduce Employee’s Healthcare Cost

1. Focus On Preventive Healthcare

Cutting down your healthcare costs has become way more accessible when we switch our focus by preventive healthcare. It is also known as prophylaxis, and are a set of measures taken to prevent any disease at any stage of life.

Such a concept has become a need of the hour for corporates. Early diagnoses through preventive screenings not only save your health premiums but also supports your employee and his family through healthcare distress.

Researchers say that following preventive healthcare at work educates your employees to be responsible for their wellbeing. Summing up with necessary biometric tests and health consultations contributes to their productive lifestyle. Further, you may encourage preventive care through in-house vaccinations or offer paid leave on medical appointments.

Also, reassuring your employees that their health comes first before anything earns you a loyal employee relationship. Offering this flexibility without a blow in their salary allows them to focus on their work without stress.

2. Check Out Avoidable Treatments

Reducing employee's healthcare costs has been the most sought after topic among corporate leaders. Not only employers but employees are facing a hard time whenever they are prescribed tests during private routine checkups. Spending on unnecessary treatments over other essential commodities isn’t a feasible choice at present times.

Detailed research by NPR revealed that Americans spend $210 billion annually on unnecessary treatments. But this brings us to a trivial question which treatment to and which not to choose? It is when you can play a crucial role in referring your employees to your known physicians.

It creates room for an open dialogue among the health practitioners and employees that ultimately avoids unnecessary tests. When your employees are getting ready for any procedures, help them educate the process and necessary precautions beforehand. It saves them from getting fooled for unnecessary diagnosis by the hospital authorities.

3. Use Pharmacy Benefits To Cut Extra Costs

Apart from the expensive heath procedure, the cost of drugs can also hurt your employee’s pocketbook. Also, employers are re-evaluating their healthcare budget by exploring ways to reduce such expenses. One way is to encourage the usage of biosimilars or generic drugs. These are low-cost, clinically effective drugs used as replacements of specialty drugs.

There are mail-in pharmacies that can also subsidize your employees’ expenses are some prescriptions, through clinical offers, or discounts for ordering in bulks. Also, availing some health insurance programs that offer discounts on drugs and tests helps you save the extra bucks.

4. Offer Holistic Wellness Programs

Its 2020 and the eldest cohort of Generation Z will soon fill your 20% of the workforce. Leaders need to take note of how Gen-Z is going to value wellbeing at the workplace. They will likely seek a workplace that encourages healthy physical, emotional, social, and financial development.

It can be achieved through a workplace wellness program that checks your holistic wellbeing. Also, as per a survey by SHRM, 60% of employers offer corporate wellness programs to boost employee productivity.

These typically include exercise regimes, weight-loss classes, smoking cessation, and diabetes programs, or disease management consultations. Offering such health services will help in lowering your employee’s health care costs in the long run.

5. Apply Value-Based Designs To Prevent Recurring Health Risks

A corporate wellness program helps in uplifting employees' general wellbeing for stable work culture. Often the targeted plans fall short due to lack of guidance and motivation. Hence managers, knowing what a health coach is, play a vital role in increasing the effectiveness of their employee engagement program.

To get high-quality patient results, you can opt for evidence-based approaches offered by various corporate wellness companies. It aligns the employee's and employer's motivation toward efficient and effective care.

It helps prevent the recurrence of illness and reduce the complexities of chronic health diseases. It also assigns the right care and the right site of service without spending money on an unnecessary diagnosis.

6. Introduce Health Coaching Services

Introducing health coaching services or telemedicine serves the purpose of your worksite wellness. It has gained popularity because of its customized and clinical-based techniques.

This process is carried out by certified personel who are experts in the niche of fitness. These health coaches play an essential role in bridging the gap between top authorities and their employees.

One of their famous techniques is the motivational interviewing process that boosts the communication gap among employees. It is done through internal motivational assessments and core principles. It helps in self-identification of one's interests, which is used for self-paced wellness programs.

7. Adopt Corporate Health Checkup Policy

The rate of success of your organization depends on your employees' health conduction. A healthy workforce is productive and discussed at work. To ensure employee well-being, offering Corporate health checkups prove to be effective in keeping track of their health status.

It enables them to follow some precautionary measures well before the health deteriorates severely. Its policy offers a wide range of diagnoses, ranging from necessary tests to expensive operation at an affordable price.

Conclusion

Helping your employees make better healthcare decisions, ensure a productive and loyal workforce. This not only reduces the employee's healthcare cost but ensures that they are getting the best and necessary treatments.

Focusing on preventive healthcare, adopting health risk assessment, or offering holistic wellness programs, are some top strategies you can take for your employees' wellness.

Now I would like to know from your perspective,

What strategies do you follow for controlling employee healthcare costs?

Let me know in the comment section below.