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The Business of Health Care Report
Today's topic is the value of health
benefits in attracting and retaining employees. Four thousand machinists at Lockheed
Martin in Fort Worth went on strike in April. When the smoke cleared, the issue wasn't
pay raises in the three-year contract renegotiation. It wasn't even the rising cost of
health benefit coverage in general. It got more specific; the issue was the change in
co-payment from a flat fee to a percentage of costs for prescription drugs. It's widely accepted that health
insurance is the most prized of all benefits for employees.and the most expensive for
many companies. Some workers will even tell you they remain in the workforce because
they are the benefit provider for their families. With health premiums rising annually
from 8.3 percent in 2000 to almost 13 percent in 2002, according to a Kaiser Foundation
survey, employers are having to tighten their belts. Because annual double-digit increases
are predicted for the future by most analysts, both employer and employee are sharing
higher costs for the benefits. Prescription drugs costs have exploded.
In 2001, prescription drugs increased by more than 15 percent - by far the largest increase
in share of the health care dollar, according to Price Waterhouse Coopers. While drugs like Claritin now are
available over the counter, there are always more potent medicines under development -
but at higher prices. Physicians usually gravitate to prescribing the next new wave of
drugs because of their enhanced effectiveness to keep patients out of hospitals. Running
parallel to the technical revolution in health care is the pharmaceutical revolution in
prescription drugs for disease management. Watch the headlines for more situations
like Lockheed, where employees are speaking out about the importance of health benefits to
their continued employment and overall job satisfaction. For Texas Health Resources
and its family of hospitals - Harris Methodist Hospitals, Presbyterian
Healthcare System and Arlington Memorial Hospital - I'm CEO
Doug Hawthorne
with "The Business of Health Care Report" on NewsRadio 1080 KRLD.
©
2003 Texas Health Resources |
I'm Doug Hawthorne, President and CEO of Texas Health Resources, with
"The Business of Health Care Report" on 