Dive Summary:
- Health care liabilities are growing faster than other university expenses, and a survey of college and university business officers released last week reported that 30% of respondents said sharing more health insurance costs with employees is an important strategy for reducing costs.
- Purdue University is taking a different approach by contracting with CHS Health Services to set up an on-site health care center, with the idea being that it will result in healthier employees and drive down long-term health care costs.
- University officials expect costs from the clinic--which will charge a co-pay for primary or acute care, but not for services like lab work or chronic condition management--to offset costs from elsewhere, as the medical center's expenses will be covered by employees' and the university's health care premium contributions.
From the article:
Health care costs are often characterized as the cancer on the budget of colleges and universities. Growing at a rate much faster than anything else on the expense side of universities' ledgers -- and showing no signs of slowing -- health care liabilities are becoming unsustainably large for colleges and universities, particularly public institutions. And right now, at least, few institutions are making substantive changes to how they offer benefits, a delay that could end up costing them big in the future. And the general rule for cancer holds true for health care costs: identify and treat the problem early and it's a lot easier to control in the long run. ...