Latest / Becker’s Payer Issues Podcast / Dennis Hillen, Senior Vice President at Oscar Health

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Dennis Hillen, Senior Vice President at Oscar Health · Becker’s Payer Issues Podcast

• 0:00
  Evernorth brings the power of wonder and relentless
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  providing clinical care and support services that provide
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  whole person care, we improve health equity, access,
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  and outcomes for the populations we serve.
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  This is Gracelyn Keller with the Becker's Healthcare
• 0:50
  podcast, and we are live at the 2024
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  payer issues roundtable.
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  I'm joined by Dennis Hillen, who is the
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  senior vice president at Oscar Health. Dennis, thanks
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  for being here. Would love to have you
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  start off by briefly introducing yourself and telling
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  us a little bit more about your current
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  role. Yeah. Happy to. Thanks for having me.
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  So I'm Dennis Hillen. I'm senior vice president
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  for our insurance strategy and and product development
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  at Oscar Health.
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  I've been in the industry now for about
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  17 years with Oscar about four and a
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  half years. Before that, I was with Humana,
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  for about 12 years, focused on innovation and
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  transformation,
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  really after some frustrating experiences
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  being a health care consumer, for a small
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  actually, medium sized business at the time, and
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  then a consumer of the product that I
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  decided on behalf of the plan or on
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  behalf of the organization
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  And, wanted to get in and try to
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  figure out how to make it easier and
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  have been dedicated my career since, and happy
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  to be here today to talk about how
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  we are making that happen at Oscar Health.
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  Wonderful. Well, thank you for taking the time.
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  And let's start our conversation
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  with growth goals. So from improving member experience
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  and expanding value based care to controlling costs,
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  payer executives have ambitious growth goals for the
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  rest of 2024 and looking into the year
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  ahead.
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  So in your role, what is your top
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  priority and how are you planning to get
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  there?
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  So we're pioneering
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  a national health care marketplace
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  for the individual consumer. So we see this
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  as a growing market. If you look at
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  the size of the ACA today, it's now
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  over 22,000,000
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  lives. We see it growing to be an
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  even much bigger,
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  component of the way people get care and
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  ultimately the the health insurance market. This is
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  gonna happen not only through growth in the
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  ACA,
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  but also in the way,
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  employers buy their health plans for their employees
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  using something called ICRA,
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  which is a health care acronym for individual
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  coverage health reimbursement arrangement. So it's certainly a
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  mouthful, but the premise behind it is is
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  actually something aligned with what employers are looking
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  to do, and that's to drive choice and
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  reduce cost. So we see that as the
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  way forward. And what we wanna do is
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  then make sure that the health care marketplace
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  operates more like the free market.
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  It's
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  one of the largest
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  industries and and experiences in the country
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  that is sort of divorced from the way
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  people normally think about the decisions they make
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  and the cost that they incur as a
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  result. And so we're looking at the ACA
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  and the individual marketplace as an opportunity to
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  bring these things together.
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  And let's talk about population health for a
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  little bit. So how is your organization ensuring
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  equitable access to care across a diverse member
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  populations,
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  and what strategies have worked well for you
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  here? Or, on the other hand, what has
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  been the most challenging?
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  So it's been said often that health care
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  is very local, and we believe that not
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  only to be geographically local, but also local
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  in the context
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  of people and the communities that they identify
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  with. So whether it be who they surround
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  themselves, their family and friends, people that they
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  feel that are like them, or the experiences
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  that they,
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  encounter in life that define who they are,
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  we think that the healthcare experience should reflect
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  that as well. So when you look at
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  our low cost, tech first products, we have
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  the ability to then bring these preferences and
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  bring these experiences
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  into the way they engage with our product
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  and, ultimately, with the health care system. So
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  if it's linguistic,
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  cultural, regional, demographic preferences, these are things that
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  can be understood,
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  hopefully, all the way from the way people
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  choose plans and make that choice I was
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  mentioning earlier within the way they experience it
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  at every touch point along the way. One
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  of the things we've done is really been
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  focusing on the Spanish speaking population.
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  So we introduced something, a product called,
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  Buenasalud,
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  which is a Spanish first solution for, Hispanic
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  and Latino members that we are launching for
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  the first time in 2025 during open enrollment.
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  So the idea behind this is that all
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  the way from the way the plan shows
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  up in the marketplace
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  through the broker they interact with,
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  through the documents they receive,
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  through the providers we help them find,
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  their experience will be Spanish first and will
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  understand, you know, the culture that they'll that
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  they are coming from as much as possible
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  based off of the information,
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  not only that they choose to share, but
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  even the way that they choose to buy
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  the product.
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  So if you look at the results as
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  that that come from this focus, you'll find
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  a couple things. One, this is based on
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  what we call Ola Oscar.
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  If you go to our website, it's high
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  oscar.com. So it's a little bit of a
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  play on that. You can also go to
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  HOLA OSCAR dot com. It'll take you to
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  a Spanish version
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  of our main website. But what we intend
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  to do with that is to show that
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  there are ways we are being Spanish first.
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  And if you look at our NPS, which
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  is something we're very proud of, across the
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  board, it's around a 66.
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  So, you know, an NPS stands for net
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  promoter score. So it's basically the difference between
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  the people who promote your product versus the
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  people who would not promote your product or
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  the detractors.
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  And we see a significant impact
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  as a result of the Spanish focus where
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  NPS is 87.
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  So if you look at that and translate
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  that to then how we can engage people
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  in their health care journey,
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  the idea that we can meet them where
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  they are is gonna drive a few things.
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  1, it's gonna drive engagement, but it's gonna
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  drive retention, and it's also gonna help drive
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  a relationship between
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  our members and the providers that we hope
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  to build a relationship with them.
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  And let's talk about leadership for a second
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  here. So keeping pace in today's dynamic health
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  care landscape is challenging. So I'd love to
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  hear a piece of advice you'd share with
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  peer leaders wanting to grow their businesses while
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  keeping members top of mind.
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  Yeah.
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  My best advice would be to remember you
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  are a health care consumer.
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  And it's amazing as as a health care
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  executive,
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  how often
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  the context of
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  the choices that you are present presented with
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  or the lack of choices you're presented with
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  often get abstracted when you are thinking about
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  your health plan as an executive.
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  And so what I would encourage is that
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  when
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  picking the plan,
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  in whatever experience that you have, think about
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  that in the in the broad context that
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  where you sit in both seats. It's it's
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  amazing how many people, you know, they know
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  once people find out I'm a health plan
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  executive,
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  these can be very smart, seasoned
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  other health care executives.
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  They reach out for help. How can I
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  get a provider? Who's a good provider? How
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  much does this cost? What is the deductible?
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  Like, not necessarily, like, in the strict definition,
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  but what does that mean relative to my
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  situation?
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  And so my encouragement
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  would be to make sure that,
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  think about it. Think about yourself as a
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  consumer when you're making leadership decisions, when you're
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  thinking about your executive role,
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  and then also talk to other people within
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  your network, within your organization and broader,
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  your family, your friends, and then just your
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  extended professional network about their experience. Learn about
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  it. You're gonna learn. It's very frustrating. It's
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  very challenging. People want help. It is our
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  obligation as health care leaders to figure out
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  how to remove those barriers and how to
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  make it much simpler.
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  So bring all that data back into them,
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  the day to day life of being an
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  executive in decisions and choices that we're faced
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  with.
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  Absolutely. Well, Dennis, thanks for being here today
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  and joining me on the Beckert's Health Care
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  podcast. Again, we are live at the 2024
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  payer issues roundtable.