UNITED HEALTHCARE SHARES THAT ACO RESULTS ARE “VERY STRONG”

Earlier this quarter, Sam Ho, Executive Vice President and CMO (Chief Medical Officer) for United Healthcare has shared publicly that ACO results appear to be very strong, up to 6% lower in total cost of health care. United has contracts with more than 450 ACOs and continues to work on the consumer side of the value based insurance design.

In similar news, AETNA, which has agreed to buy Humana, is going through aggressive re-contracting as part of their movement towards value based arrangements. According to Charles Kennedy, M.D. and chief population health officer for Healthagen, an Aetna subsidiary, “We want to get to 75% of members being in value-based [care] by 2020.

Kennedy has also shared how important for there has to be high incentives for provider organization to move to a value based contract. He stated, “The first thing we say is we’re going to launch products to bring you more patients.” According to Kennedy, around one third of provider organizations that are in value based contract with Aetna, are taking downside risk. However, once you get beyond large organizations, the downside risk is less.