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How will we measure a 20% improvement in health? Our industry has traditionally measured health in terms of progression of vital signs, length of life or some other quantitative metric. But at the end of the day, shouldn’t we also be measuring whether or not someone is feeling healthy? Are they happy with their level of physical activity? Not exercising but just enjoying life? We became excited when we learned about the Healthy Days measurement developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This simple survey asks people four simple questions to rate people’s recent days of physical health, mental health, and activity limitation, and has been well validated for measuring population health. So we will use it.
Despite all the attention paid to the obesity epidemic and the growing prevalence of preventable diseases, in the U.S., as a society and as an industry we've made health hard, even as our daily lives become easier. Our "convenience culture" translates into too-available entertainment options, fast food, sedentary transportation and the like. The fact is, if you want to eat right and live a healthy lifestyle, you have to work at it. And if you need help managing an illness, the complexity and countless other barriers presented by those of us in the health industry can often be nearly impossible to navigate and overcome.
It shouldn't be this way. Health should be easy. The good news is that, through the increasing use of mobile devices with their real‐time networking capabilities and by addressing health collaboratively in our communities, we're accelerating the "democratization of health care." We're giving consumers the tools they need to see medical professionals virtually, to Skype with the doctor instead of wait in her office, to self‐monitor vital signs, to connect with health‐related communities and to choose physicians based on reliable data about outcomes and cost. We’re also helping communities address the way their structure and environment impact health. In so doing, we're gradually realigning a health system that's vastly out of balance. For example, 50% of what MAKES us healthy is our own behaviors. But what we SPEND on healthy behaviors is only 4% of the nation's total health care bill each year.
We started with our own employees. Four out of 10 of our associates employed since 2012 have improved their health profile. They've reduced their modifiable health risks including high BMI, blood pressure, abnormal glucose and other risks. And that 40% has achieved an aggregate weight loss of 194,000 pounds.
It works with people enrolled in our health plans, too. Last year we identified more than 36 million opportunities for “gaps‐in‐care” health improvement, including 557,000 opportunities to impact drug safety and 2.3 million opportunities to increase medication adherence. Our newly managed Humana Chronic Care Program members experienced 496,000 more days at home than they would have had they not enrolled in the program. And our Medicare Advantage members in accountable‐care relationships have a 4 percent lower hospital inpatient admission rate than traditional fee‐for‐service Medicare.
One showcase for our efforts comes from our partnership with the city of San Antonio, which has put in place similar 2020 targets. In 2014, Humana hosted a Clinical Town Hall, where community, business and clinical leaders tackled neighborhood‐level health issues using robust data analysis. We plan to bring specific health, diet, and lifestyle resources where they're needed most. We’re also collaborating with the community to create a Health Information Exchange that ties together the electronic record-keeping systems of physicians, allowing us to identify patient care needs and opportunities in real time.
You can read about these results in more depth in the first of what will become periodic Humana 2020 reports by clicking here.
Bruce Broussard is the President and CEO of Humana, one of the country’s leading health and well-being companies.
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