Dr Damion Marmion urges all private healthcare players to unite around cost-effectiveness and quality
This lack of any clear sign of sustained growth, while wider economic prospects have begun to improve, is a serious concern for the industry. Providers and brokers are faced not only with the challenges of rising prices and a drop in customers, but the fact that our potential and existing customers have access at any time to a free alternative in the NHS.
So why choose private healthcare? We, the providers, insurers and intermediaries, need to raise the bar ever higher to distinguish ourselves and prove the quality we deliver; to make a stronger case to employers and all consumers of group schemes; and to both earn and maintain their trust and loyalty.
Searching for reasons
The simple truth is that, however effective our services may be, if the sector isn’t succeeding in making them accessible to a growing proportion of the population, particularly when people have been struggling financially, we are failing patients. We’re also failing employers that need a fit and healthy workforce – and it’s time we pulled off the sticking plaster to really look at what’s going on underneath.
How did we get here? A two-year investigation into private healthcare by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) identified that customers were losing out because of a lack of competition among private hospitals and doctors. All stakeholders in private healthcare have failed to engage publicly and actively with each other to build and promote the benefits of the sector.
But there is good news. Our report reveals there is a clear and significant opportunity for a bright future for the sector, despite the many challenges it is facing. We know there is still a high demand for private healthcare, for both individual and corporate schemes. The decline in customers is not due to individuals, businesses and their employees failing to see the value in private healthcare – they believe the care and services we provide have substantial benefits, but they want (and need) them to be more affordable, and provided in a way that suits their modern lifestyles.
In a climate where 140 million working days are lost to sickness each year (at a cost of £9bn to business), employers are increasingly seeing that they have a role to play in keeping their workforce healthy, productive and in work and, as such, they want accessible and affordable healthcare.
In recent years there has been an expansion in workplace health support, and employers recognise the economic and social value of keeping their employees well – which has lead to some companies offering support for private healthcare. However, cost is the most common barrier to buying private health cover – our research has shown that many customers are reaching the tipping point for the amount they are prepared to pay for it. Employers and individuals also expressed concern over a lack of transparency about value and the quality being delivered.
This is part of a growing trend: patients increasingly want to be involved in decisions about their healthcare and are demanding that information about outcomes and quality is clear and readily available.
They also want quality healthcare support and services to be delivered in new, more convenient ways that reflect their modern lifestyles. In turn, employers that take responsibility for their staff through corporate schemes are scrutinising what they’re getting for their money and pushing for these changes to get the best-value and most relevant product for their key workers.
