DSS Health Care Engagement Index™

Background

A new survey conducted by Towers Watson and the National Business Group on Health (NBGH), finds that more than half (58%) of employers say the biggest obstacle to changing employee health-related behavior is the lack of employee engagement.

The DSS Health Engagement Index™ (HCEI™) is a metric that tells you where your employees are in the consumer engagement continuum and provides insight on how to move them toward higher level of engagement in their personal health care and the health care system overall:

• It is well known that wellness and disease management programs can positively impact member health, expenditures on services and claims experience.
• It is also known that unless you get members engaged in their personal health care then they are unlikely to take advantage of wellness and disease management programs.
• Higher levels of engagement translate into higher levels of participation in your programs, programs offered by others and personal health regimens.

Our extensive work in health and wellness for health plans and other health care organizations and the analysis of others led us to these conclusions. These conclusions, in turn, led us to develop the DSS Health Engagement Index™ where we:

• Capitalized on our many years of experience understanding the health care consumer and the factors that contribute to their active engagement in health care decisions.
• Did specialized research and a number of exploratory surveys.
• Used solid science, advanced statistical modeling and four underlying constructs (health literacy, knowledge, attitudes and behavior) to build the DSS Health Care Engagement Index.
• Analyzed more than 10 million consolidated claims records in relation to the index.
• Refined the index over the past year and produced reduced and detailed forms.
• Have reported the Index for the past three quarters for the country as a whole and for various subpopulations of interest, including seniors, minorities, the uninsured, etc.

™Health Care Engagement Index and HCEI are trademarks of DSS Research.