Tag: chronic disease

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How Schools are Saving Money and Lives
Preventive Care Simultaneously Helps Patients and Employers

Doctor and Employee, Onsite ClinicToday’s healthcare system provides an array of screenings for detecting everything from cancer to cholesterol issues. Screenings have become an essential component of preventive healthcare. Detecting health issues early can be the key to avoiding costly and complicated illnesses in the future.

In step with the movement towards consumer education, well-informed employer groups and school districts are launching onsite and near-site health and wellness centers to incentivize employees, dependents, and retirees to keep up-to-date on disease management and preventive health screenings.
Employers are discovering these value-added benefits of the onsite and near-site health model:

  • As a first line of defense, the onsite-care model ensures health screenings are free, easy, and conveniently accessible.
  • Unlike outdated wellness programs that are triggered by large claims or passive educational material, the onsite-care model includes an active approach based on extensive lab work and Health Risk Assessments (HRA).
  • The medical team can offer recommendations for when a patient should be tested and can provide customized care to meet each individual’s unique needs.
  • Physicians can proactively bring medical concerns to the attention of patients as well as create a potentially life-saving plan-of-action for patients to avoid future health problems.

A national Health and Productivity Survey from 2015 indicated that HRA and biometric screenings remain popular components of worksite wellness programs, with 57% of 700 surveyed employer organizations offering an HRA. Through easy accessibility, onsite and near-site health centers offer a solution for increasing utilization of HRAs.

Florida-based Crowne Consulting Group and its affiliates are helping dozens of employer organizations to operate onsite healthcare centers, in which high percentages of members utilize HRAs and screening programs, helping clients prevent high-dollar claims for chronic diseases including diabetes and congestive heart failure. Pasco schools’ first-year results included a 34 percent decrease in diabetes claims costs.

Increased screenings, HRAs, and easy access to preventative care are helping employers achieve millions of dollars in financial savings for taxpayers and reallocating those dollars for other school resources. Additionally, by shifting from disease management to disease prevention, health centers are providing a positive impact on members’ health and their wallets.

Contact Crowne Consulting Group for more information about onsite care.

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Accessibility Churns Success

Employers are making healthcare more effective by offering medical services at or nearby the worksite. By handling all administration and operations, onsite care experts can help shift attention from disease management to disease prevention.  Over 30 employee health and wellness centers in Florida are drastically reducing health costs through the help of Crowne Consulting Group, Inc. and medical partnerships.

Onsite care extends benefits of free office visits, screenings, and increased physician face-time for employees.  Employers can stick with their current healthcare plan and benefits provider.  The only difference is that the employees now have the option to handle medical appointments and wellness visits at the worksite rather than at more costly outside providers.

“Costs for operating an onsite health center can be 60 percent less than paying for a fee-for-service model,” said Ray Tomlinson, president of Crowne Consulting Group. “And it’s not just employers seeing the savings – the employees are also reaping the benefits through the increased accessibility to care.”

Utilization proves to be high because employee health centers offer on-demand medical service for employees, their dependents, and the retiree population for no out-of-pocket costs.

  • With a free and reliable health center nearby, employees are more likely to keep chronic issues, such as hypertension and diabetes, in check.
  • Workers are equipped to take better care of themselves, while also taking less time off and requiring fewer serious medical procedures.
  • Quality healthcare in a convenient location reduces costs to employees, and, by extension, taxpayers.

Employers can experience additional savings and services when the workers’ compensation program is integrated with an onsite-health-center model.  One Florida school district slashed their Worker’s Compensation costs by 50 percent in one year.  Crowne and their medical partners have also teamed with top-rated firms to bring insurance products and management services for fully-insured and self-insured school districts.

When considering onsite care, it’s important to ask the right questions to ensure your operators are able to meet and exceed your needs for lowering health costs while making quality care more accessible to your employees.  With expertise in serving public sector employers such as school boards, city and county government, as well as private organizations – Crowne specializes in making healthcare more accessible and more affordable.

Contact Crowne’s Expert Now.

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For Immediate Release
For additional information, contact:
rtomlinson@crowneinc.com

View/Print this Release in PDF format

LOWERING HEALTH COSTS WHILE ENHANCING EMPLOYEE BENEFITS

City of Oviedo’s onsite health center operated by Crowne Consulting Group helps employer improve employee healthcare while lowering medical trend increases.

Feb. 28, 2012 (Ocoee, Fla.) – Crowne Consulting Group, Inc., an employee benefits consulting firm specializing in onsite health and wellness centers in Florida, reports that the City of Oviedo reduced health cost trends by adding a worksite health center for employees.

Since opening the center in March of 2010 in an effort to avoid passing increased health costs to city workers, the City of Oviedo reversed its trend down to just a 2 percent annual increase.  This defies the nation’s average 12 percent annual rise for medical inflation.  Financial savings include all operational costs for the health center, which is co-operated by Ocoee-based Crowne Consulting Group and Tennessee-based CareHere, LLC.

City Manager Kathryn Breazeale believes that over the past two years, employees benefited by receiving free generic medication and health and wellness services provided through the clinic.

Approximately 85 percent of the city’s 245 eligible employees visited the free clinic in the first year for more than 3,000 service appointments including primary care, screenings, chronic disease management, digital X-rays, EKG, and occupational services.  In addition to zero deductibles for services, 80 percent of the city’s employees benefited from free health risk assessments with lab work for evaluation of cholesterol, blood sugar, liver function, and blood pressure.

“Assessing risks early and engaging employees to manage conditions is a contributing factor to thousands of dollars saved for employees and taxpayers,” said Ray Tomlinson, president of Crowne Consulting Group.

In addition, thanks to wholesale rates, the city’s total prescription costs through Crowne and CareHere decreased 8 percent per member.

About Crowne Consulting Group, Inc:

Crowne Consulting Group, Inc., founded in 1986, consults and provides administrative oversight services for onsite health and wellness centers to employers and is a related company with The Crowne Group, an employee benefits consulting firm, specializing in employer solutions and personal lines of insurance.  Crowne’s experts have a cumulative 100 years of experience in serving public sector employers such as school boards, city and county government, as well as private organizations.  The firm’s mission is to bring innovative solutions that meet the fiscal responsibility of employers and maximizes investments.  Solutions include health reimbursement arrangements, self-funded plans, onsite health and wellness centers, as well as risk management and human resources consulting.

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