Claims, Culture and Contraception…
by KDunn
I’m a HR person, so you know that contraception is the last thing I want to talk about… Don’t get in an employee’s personal business, etc…
Ray Brusca, VP of Benefits at Black and Decker, would tell me (and you, if you’re like me) that contraception is something you need to talk more about, given the costs of unplanned pregnancy.
Still don’t buy it? Consider Ray’s data that 50% of all pregnancies are unplanned, and you might change your mind…
Brusca’s presentation in Track Six on Monday (Employee-Centric Benefits for Prevention and Improve Care Management) started with the assumption that 50% of all pregnancies aren’t desired. That fact alone suggests that more education on contraception is employee-centric. The problem, according to Brusca, is that the U.S. culture prefers means of contraception that are unreliable. For that reason, Black and Decker actively promotes education on Long Acting Reversible Contraception (LARC), the best example of which is the IUD.
Use of forms of LARC is strong in Europe, weak in the U.S. So Black and Decker communicates the pro’s of contraception, specially LARC’s often.
Still not convinced of the business case? Brusca points to Black and Decker’s own experience with a catastrophic claim, in which a woman who had just given birth became pregnant six weeks later. Due to limitations of the human body, she was forced to give birth to a premature child at the 23 week mark, and the birth resulted in 1.8 million in claims toward the Black and Decker medical plan.
That’s worth a second look…
