Many of Your Employees May Be Health Care Illiterate

Independent research firm Researchscape surveyed more than one thousand US employees who have employer sponsored health care and determined that knowledge gaps are causing the vast majority to miss out on opportunities to reduce their health care expenses.

‍

Further, in the subsequent analysis of this data conducted as part of Optavise’s 2023 Healthcare Literacy Report, the authors stress the point that employers putting effort and resources into better educating employees about the benefits offerings available to them can have a meaningful impact in terms of enabling those employees to make more informed choices, which improves net outcomes to everyone’s mutual benefit. 

‍

There were several key findings in the report, including:

• Health care literacy is extremely important given the critical function that health insurance plays in the lives of employees and their families. Not only are physical and financial well-being on the line with significant implications for both employees and employers, but employees that have a greater awareness about how their choices affect their total out-of-pocket expenses tend to report higher benefit satisfaction levels, as well.
• Knowledge gaps surrounding health plan information are more significant in some industries and employee demographics than in others. Retail employees, younger employees, and employees who earn less than 55 thousand US dollars annually are more prone to lack a sufficient understanding to avoid unnecessary healthcare spending, for example.
• There was a drop in employee confidence between last year’s report and this year’s report in terms of their awareness about how their plan is supposed to work. In fact, almost half of respondents claimed they learned more about their benefits plan from friends, family, and colleagues than from formal company/benefits communications, with only slightly more than 1 in 4 respondents listing HR departments as their primary knowledge source on these matters, followed by 18% who listed insurance company reps and 15% who listed consultants and other outside subject-matter experts. 
• Fewer employees are researching and/or contacting multiple health care providers in order to compare costs, and the same is true for cost-comparing by employees when purchasing prescription drugs, both of which can lead to outsized and unnecessary health care expenditures.
• Provider network status is a significant driver of overspending on healthcare, given that only a little more than one-third of employees check the status of a provider before pursuing care. 
• Not all types of benefit-related educational formats are equal in the eyes of employees, who tend to prefer personal, face-to-face guidance from human resources staff despite the growing number of resources available online and/or through digital platforms.  Based on the survey results, about 84% of employees believe personal guidance to be helpful while 68% found online resources helpful. 

‍

Ultimately, the data makes clear that employers that are more proactive in their approach to employee health benefit education and that provide continual information, training, and guidance on these matters will create a workforce that is much better equipped to manage health issues as they inevitably encounter them, which in turn has a positive return and reduces healthcare spending overall. 

‍

You can read more about this topic here.