Prevention is cheaper than treatment

Fifty years ago, minus about six months, I began a new career in the Employee Relations Department for a large chemical company back East. My initial assignments were in benefits. As all benefits administrators, I got a lot of questions from employees about what is covered under the company’s health insurance policy and what isn’t.
Frequently there were differences of opinion and usually they centered on things that were considered “preventative” drugs or treatment. Back then for the most part one would talk about coverage for “preventative” items and the insurance company would think you had an extra hole in your head or they would laugh. One representative once said to me, “you have to git what you are going to git before you will git any coverage.” English might not be perfect but the message was clear’

Over the years the philosophy has changed some. Recently I read in an Associated Press story about this very topic. While many “preventative” drugs and treatments are now covered we still aren’t there completely.
The article said a new study shows picking up the tab for certain medications taken by people who had suffered a heart attack could save insurance companies money in the long run. If it is going to save the big boys some money some of that savings will eventually trickle down to me, the policy holder, and I favor that.
Continuing with the article, “A combination of heart medications and cholesterol-lowering drugs has been estimated to reduce the risk of death from heart disease by 80 percent compared with a placebo. Yet the medications continue to be greatly underused.
“One answer to that problem would be to provide full coverage of the heart medicines to those who had a previous heart attack, instead of requiring the patient to pick up a share of that cost. Often the extra coverage could be entirely offset by the savings generated when health problems are averted,” said researchers at Harvard Medical School.
It seems the extra coverage would cost insurers an average of $550 per patient, but that would lead to fewer deaths and nonfatal heart attacks and strokes, saving $1,731 in costs per heart-related event. That’s a cool $1,181 in savings per event for the insurance companies. Multiple that by the millions of policy holders with heart problems and that would mean Billions in savings for the big boys.
That seems to me to be a great move, considering some of that savings would be passed on to me, the policy holder. To end where I started, maybe I don’t “have to git what I’m gitting to git coverage.” Sounds good to me.
Such are the people, places and things that have touched my life in my home!