Latest / Becker’s Payer Issues Podcast / Health Plan Readiness for 2026: Network Trends, Data & AI
Transcript
- 0:00This is Brian Zimmerman with Becker's Healthcare. Thank
- 0:02you so much for tuning in to the
- 0:04Becker's Healthcare podcast.
- 0:05Today, we're going to talk about health plan
- 0:07readiness for 2026,
- 0:09trends shaping the next phase of change.
- 0:12Joining me for this discussion is Steve Levin,
- 0:14CEO of Quest Analytics.
- 0:16Steve, thank you so much for being on
- 0:18the podcast. Thanks for having me, Brian.
- 0:20To get going here, can you can you
- 0:22share a bit about your yourself, your professional
- 0:25background,
- 0:26what you're doing as as as CEO of
- 0:28Quest Analytics?
- 0:30Yeah. So who am I?
- 0:31Exactly. It's
- 0:34so, look. I usually describe myself as a,
- 0:38reformed consultant.
- 0:40I was a HP management consultant. I did
- 0:42a corporate development and sort of, strategy work,
- 0:46among my clients for a lot of years
- 0:48for
- 0:48health plans
- 0:50and payer companies,
- 0:51health systems,
- 0:53consumer product companies.
- 0:55And then, at at some point after, you
- 0:57know, over a decade or so,
- 0:59I decided I should try and,
- 1:01pre you know, do what I preach, if
- 1:03you will. And I hopped over the wall.
- 1:06One of my clients invited me to start
- 1:08a company.
- 1:09So I,
- 1:10engaged in building a venture. Right? Built a
- 1:12new company for a decade or so in,
- 1:14predictive analytics and rev cycle
- 1:17back when, big data and SAS was all
- 1:20brand new. This was 2005,
- 1:222006 era.
- 1:23Built a predictive analytics business, serve serving providers,
- 1:27health systems, and, hospitals.
- 1:30And from there,
- 1:31that ultimately was
- 1:33acquired by sort of a middleware company, a
- 1:35clearinghouse.
- 1:36So I got to go from the provider
- 1:38side to the middle. And then,
- 1:40in 2020,
- 1:42by the start of COVID,
- 1:43I joined Quest,
- 1:45and I became, CEO here, which is sort
- 1:47of a capstone opportunity for me.
- 1:50Quest is really interesting, you know, network design.
- 1:53We live at sort of the e the
- 1:55intersection of of, payers,
- 1:58providers,
- 1:59regulators, and then, you know, networks or what
- 2:01members experience and health plans are built on.
- 2:04So it's a very interesting
- 2:06spot in the middle.
- 2:08And, you know, in in the kind of
- 2:09softer moments, I would say, it's a great
- 2:12mission.
- 2:13We're a company that is
- 2:15exclusively focused on helping every American get access
- 2:18to health care and helping sort of find
- 2:20those networks and make them work. So it's
- 2:22it's really quite exciting. So, that's who I
- 2:25am.
- 2:26Wonderful to have you. I think your your
- 2:28professional journey lends you an interesting perspective in
- 2:31in sort of sitting in this this this
- 2:33intersection space. Right? I think that's also a
- 2:35valuable perspective for for our listeners to get.
- 2:37So
- 2:38let let's get into it. Health plans, of
- 2:40course, are, you know, getting ready for another
- 2:42year of significant regulatory and market change.
- 2:45What are the most important pressures you're seeing
- 2:47as sort of these plans look toward 2026
- 2:50and how they're shaping strategic priorities? You know?
- 2:53There's always transformation disruption
- 2:56happening in health care. Of course, it's not
- 2:58static, but this does seem like an
- 3:01exceptionally,
- 3:03interesting moment in in in the industry. So
- 3:05can you expand on how health plans are
- 3:07sort of getting ready for the changes that
- 3:09are coming?
- 3:10Look. It you know, it so first off,
- 3:12it is an interesting time, and health care
- 3:15has never been static. It's it's always been
- 3:18changing. I think the pace of change recently
- 3:20has really picked up.
- 3:22And,
- 3:23you know, I think every everyone listening to
- 3:25this understands that there's sort of margin pressure,
- 3:29in health care, and that problem has gotten
- 3:31much more acute.
- 3:32You know, behind that, there's a bunch of
- 3:34different things that are shaping that shape that
- 3:37pressure and that acceleration, which in some ways
- 3:39are gonna
- 3:40drive what we think of as 2026
- 3:42and sort of what payers, providers, regulators are
- 3:46all thinking about and likely to be kinda
- 3:47trying to accomplish.
- 3:49You know, we have
- 3:51the underlying
- 3:52cost drugs, devices, equipment, all
- 3:55those continue to kind of accelerate and, you
- 3:57know, increase in cost.
- 3:59We have utilization
- 4:00that's that's gone up, sort of a little
- 4:02bit of the hangover out of the public
- 4:04health emergency.
- 4:05All of that is leading to sort of
- 4:07MLR pressures,
- 4:09challenges of sort of
- 4:11having the cost and the margin match the
- 4:14plan design.
- 4:15We're seeing, as a result of some of
- 4:17this, all these,
- 4:19events,
- 4:20a series of things. So first off, we're
- 4:21seeing regulators get really sensitive to
- 4:24real provider access. Is the provider
- 4:27seeing patients? Is this location real?
- 4:30Is there sufficient,
- 4:32you know, availability? So average wait time sort
- 4:34of things.
- 4:35That that focus on access is
- 4:38really, you know, pressing things around data and
- 4:41data integrity. We'll get to that later.
- 4:43Providers are are facing real contract and and
- 4:46and rate challenges, and they are consolidating. So
- 4:49we're seeing the continued
- 4:51consolidation of provider groups. So we're seeing health
- 4:53systems get bigger. We're seeing groups get bigger.
- 4:56You can see that when you look around
- 4:57and look at the contract disputes. I'm up
- 4:59in the New England area,
- 5:01and,
- 5:02you know,
- 5:03Bay State Health and and
- 5:05South Coast Health, we're seeing every almost everyday
- 5:08challenges of of in network, out of network
- 5:10negotiations with our local
- 5:12payers up here. And then we're seeing, you
- 5:15know, the the payers themselves trying to figure
- 5:18out how to
- 5:19do more,
- 5:21manage utilization against the premium and control sort
- 5:24of the the whole premium dollars.
- 5:26It is becoming
- 5:28like a you know, one of the things
- 5:29that I like to think of it is
- 5:31a game of Tetris.
- 5:32This is why we all play the the
- 5:33the game of Tetris, and so the blocks
- 5:35are falling.
- 5:36Groups are getting bigger. The financial challenges
- 5:40are getting bigger, and the blocks are falling
- 5:42faster. We we have to sort of make
- 5:44these networks
- 5:45kind of all fit,
- 5:48and it's speeding up.
- 5:50You know, I think the the pace of
- 5:51change in Washington has gone up a lot
- 5:53too recently. We're seeing more
- 5:55more innovation out of CMS, more innovation at
- 5:58the state level in the regulatory thing. So
- 5:59all this stuff is accelerating faster faster and
- 6:02more
- 6:03pressing. More pressing. The stakes are high.
- 6:06You laid out so much of of what's
- 6:08happening in the environment to make that sort
- 6:10of that pace of change that that is
- 6:12easy. If you ever played Tetris, it's really
- 6:14easy to to picture that when things start
- 6:16moving a little bit faster, it gets real
- 6:18tricky. So,
- 6:20wanna get here now to I wanna reference
- 6:22sort of a survey we did earlier this
- 6:24year that
- 6:25suggest high performing plants often operate with more
- 6:28targeted,
- 6:29streamlined networks.
- 6:31With that in mind,
- 6:32what what data insights should executives rely on
- 6:35to assess the performance of their networks? I
- 6:37know access is super important.
- 6:39But especially if they're considering a narrow network
- 6:41strategy, what what should be they be be
- 6:43looking at measuring? It
- 6:45it's,
- 6:46so your your research was very, very,
- 6:49enlightening,
- 6:51and it actually, by the way, just it
- 6:53it married or kind of matched some research
- 6:55done by the the KFF
- 6:57who similarly did some work looking at Medicare
- 6:59Advantage Plans and star ratings.
- 7:01Their research showed that sort of it's e
- 7:03you know, low performing networks of three stars
- 7:06and less tend to be narrow narrow as
- 7:08well, but they found that high performing networks,
- 7:11the five stars, were also narrow. I mean,
- 7:14they're actually in fact the narrowest,
- 7:16which was reinforcing to what you guys are
- 7:18talking about, which is, you know, bigger is
- 7:20not necessarily better when it comes to networks,
- 7:23and the member experience and the provider.
- 7:26I think what
- 7:28it's interesting is for for many years, we've
- 7:30all thought that the way to kind of
- 7:32control cost is to kind of
- 7:35shape utilization
- 7:36of of how members
- 7:38utilize health care. So we're gonna help influence
- 7:40them and direct them to better doctors, or
- 7:42we're gonna try
- 7:44and kinda, you know, bad words like gatekeep.
- 7:47And and
- 7:48when increasingly, what what everyone is seeing is
- 7:51that a better designed foundational
- 7:54network actually leads to a better experience. It
- 7:56leads to,
- 7:58less abrasion
- 7:59for providers. It leads to better natural
- 8:03care routines, care pathways.
- 8:06It leads to better outcomes, more satisfaction, lower
- 8:08cost, all that good stuff. And
- 8:12even regulators are understanding that bigger is not
- 8:14necessarily better. What they really want is true
- 8:17access. They want to understand that that, are
- 8:20all these primary care doctors,
- 8:22in fact seeing patients?
- 8:24Are all these locations, in fact, real?
- 8:27And,
- 8:28you know, so what we're we're seeing
- 8:31that it's,
- 8:33a conversation about network composition, who's in, who's
- 8:36out, how to think of that.
- 8:38You know, even in
- 8:40step back for a sec. We even use
- 8:41the word like narrow network. A narrow network
- 8:44may have a lot of primary care access
- 8:48points. A narrow network may be actually quite
- 8:51broad for ambulatory surgery centers.
- 8:54It may just be narrower as it gets
- 8:56to whether it's the acute or some of
- 8:57the some of the more
- 9:00value sensitive things like oncology or other specialties.
- 9:04So, like,
- 9:05narrow, we ban you a word like narrow
- 9:07around, and it every network
- 9:10in every sort of care
- 9:12footprint has very, very,
- 9:14specialized and sort of nuanced dimensions to it.
- 9:17And that's what
- 9:19it really comes down to sort of the
- 9:21the challenge for for executives.
- 9:24It you really do need some very granular,
- 9:26high quality local data.
- 9:29You need to understand,
- 9:31the provider,
- 9:32their care capabilities, like what kind of services
- 9:35they really do. We should understand their their
- 9:38their their value in that care service. So
- 9:40is it, you know, low cost and not
- 9:43always high value. Low cost can be low
- 9:46cost.
- 9:47And so what's the value at the care
- 9:49site? And, ultimately, I think that we're finding
- 9:52that it's more and more important for people
- 9:53to think about
- 9:55the network relative to other networks in the
- 9:58market.
- 9:59This is a consumer product at some level.
- 10:02Right? We are trying to create a have
- 10:05a have a consumer
- 10:06experience great health care, and so you need
- 10:08to understand
- 10:09the provider, the service line, and then sort
- 10:12of the other options in the market.
- 10:14And the last part, Brian, which I think
- 10:17we all intuitively understand is,
- 10:19networks are, you know, highly dynamic.
- 10:223%
- 10:24of the
- 10:25provider kind of at location information is changing
- 10:28in any given month.
- 10:29Providers are retiring, groups are restructuring,
- 10:33offices move. I mean, like, for a lot
- 10:35of reasons, the network that was here last
- 10:37month isn't here today.
- 10:39Right. Right. It's it's it's an interesting space.
- 10:42And and it it's a lot to get
- 10:43your arms around too,
- 10:45in terms of really getting that that that
- 10:47accuracy and understanding what's happening in in markets
- 10:49and your networks. So what steps can can
- 10:52health plan leaders take to to really
- 10:54strengthen performance and get more efficient, but they've
- 10:57also gotta maintain compliance. Right? Yeah.
- 11:00Can you talk a little bit unpack that
- 11:01for us, especially when it comes to ensuring
- 11:04that private provider data accuracy, network adequacy, those
- 11:07those types of things that you're mentioning? How
- 11:09can you pursue better performance while maintaining compliance?
- 11:13Right. You know,
- 11:15interestingly so a lot of people at the
- 11:16moment, a lot of organizations,
- 11:18if they don't step back and think about
- 11:20the network, the network is sort of
- 11:23one of the few
- 11:25or the core assets
- 11:27that connects all parts of the of a
- 11:30a payer,
- 11:32business. Right? It's
- 11:34part you have the bills that to be
- 11:35compliant, then you have to design it so
- 11:38that it sort of meets the membership and
- 11:41the market needs.
- 11:42You have to, you know, fit the network
- 11:45and match it to the product and the
- 11:47offering.
- 11:48The network will dictate in many ways what
- 11:50members they're gonna see and and where who
- 11:53they're gonna be working with. So it it's
- 11:56a very, very it's an enterprise wide asset.
- 11:59And I think that gets to this sort
- 12:01of the imperative for what a a payer
- 12:03needs to do as they look to kind
- 12:05of
- 12:06really be, you know, performing here. The the
- 12:08yes. At one level, they have to create
- 12:11sort of a single place where their network
- 12:13data lives. They need to create
- 12:16a, kind of a clear,
- 12:19trusted enterprise
- 12:20source of content.
- 12:22They need to be somewhat rigorous, relentless, and
- 12:25continuous on making sure that their database is
- 12:29higher fidelity. And if those are the things
- 12:31that's perfect,
- 12:33it just sort of has to be continually
- 12:34managed and maintained.
- 12:36The second thing you need to do is
- 12:37you need to make that content available across
- 12:40their company so that their it guesses their
- 12:42teams that are focused on compliance,
- 12:45need access to that content to make sure
- 12:46they understand and are analyzing relative to the
- 12:49the regulatory requirements.
- 12:51But they also need that same information available
- 12:54for their mark in market teams who are
- 12:55thinking about their their messaging and their marketing
- 12:59in their in their kind of sales
- 13:02programs. And so you need we would think
- 13:05of it you need a network decisioning tool
- 13:07that crosses the organization,
- 13:10serves a content to each of your
- 13:13kind of your teams that are sort of
- 13:15at the front lines of delivering
- 13:18in delivering health care to their to the
- 13:20market.
- 13:21It needs to be kind of workflow enabling.
- 13:23It needs to eliminate handoffs or simplify handoffs,
- 13:26and it needs to get the right information
- 13:29to the experts at the right point.
- 13:31You know, the network conversation needs to move
- 13:34from being what I think it is reactive
- 13:36to proactive.
- 13:37It needs to help everybody sort of understand
- 13:40not only not where they've been, but where
- 13:42they wanna get to.
- 13:44And,
- 13:45a lot of what we see in, across
- 13:47the industry is conversations
- 13:49not about the business or the network,
- 13:52but about sort of whose data was more
- 13:55right or or wrong.
- 13:57We need to shift this from a data
- 13:59debate
- 14:00to one about of action and decisions.
- 14:04I I appreciate the comments. And and and
- 14:06I think, you know, to do this work,
- 14:09to do what what you're talking about doing,
- 14:11getting your arms around that data, making that
- 14:12content available across their company,
- 14:15messaging, informing, marketing, all all that, Steve. Right?
- 14:17You're gonna need you're gonna need
- 14:20a a a particular emphasis on on on
- 14:22technology, and there's perhaps a a two letter
- 14:24acronym. I'm dancing around here. But what's the
- 14:27what's the role of technology
- 14:29in this process and driving innovation? And, I
- 14:32guess, what should folks help plan leaders listening
- 14:34to this really be paying special attention to
- 14:36in 2026?
- 14:38Yeah. Look.
- 14:39So I think, you know, we we are
- 14:41seeing and I've and I've seen that every
- 14:44every organization has a CRM tool. Right? They've
- 14:46they've they've got someone doing their client relationship
- 14:49management and doing marketing and messaging. And mostly
- 14:52most people have
- 14:53some
- 14:54single enterprise,
- 14:56accounts receivable and accounts payable application. And organizations
- 14:59have a single if you're if you're in,
- 15:02materials, you've got an ERP in in resource
- 15:05planning and supply chain. Well, I think networks,
- 15:08is a similar spot. We need an enterprise
- 15:10network platform, decisioning platform.
- 15:13So you need a tool that connects it.
- 15:15But but all these tools, as as you're
- 15:17alluding to,
- 15:19are are reliant on great data
- 15:21and sort of bringing that data to a
- 15:23single spot.
- 15:24I think it they then need sort of
- 15:27what I think are accepted
- 15:28analytics.
- 15:29In the unique thing about networks is because
- 15:32of the geolocation
- 15:33aspect of them, they're they're understanding a network
- 15:38and how it meets a member need is
- 15:40very processing intensive. It's a time and distance
- 15:43calculation.
- 15:44There's an experience
- 15:46driving issue,
- 15:47and you need
- 15:48what are effectively sort of the in the
- 15:50accepted endorsed
- 15:52measures of that,
- 15:54so that people can rely on the conversations
- 15:57of measurement.
- 15:58And then lastly, you need to kinda put
- 16:00all this stuff in the context of a
- 16:02workflow, and you have to connect people. And
- 16:03I think this last part is where we're
- 16:06gonna see
- 16:07that two letter acronym that you are kinda
- 16:09dancing around, which is AI and Agentic and
- 16:12what we're seeing in there. I think with
- 16:14good data,
- 16:15with good analytics, you can start to accelerate
- 16:19the kind of the insight and decision making
- 16:22with some of this Agentic technology.
- 16:24You can put experts at the edges of
- 16:27organizations
- 16:28and get them access to content that in
- 16:31a way that they can engage with it
- 16:33faster and get fat better decisioning.
- 16:35So it's a really exciting time.
- 16:38You know, we're seeing
- 16:40organizations really get excited about this idea of
- 16:43a network platform.
- 16:44We're seeing people understand the power of data
- 16:47and and the need to to kind of
- 16:49really govern and and and kind of integrate
- 16:52the data pieces.
- 16:54And, slowly but surely,
- 16:56getting excited about AI and how it can
- 16:58be real workflow enabling.
- 17:00Yeah. Because the the the AI technology component
- 17:03of it, it's it's kind of there. Right?
- 17:05It's it's got the capacities. It's but it's
- 17:08it's kind of about getting that data right,
- 17:10getting that data underneath it so you can
- 17:12you can really unlock the
- 17:15the the power of that technology. Correct, Steve?
- 17:17Yeah. And it's funny. When I think about
- 17:20the AI space, a lot of
- 17:22we're not looking at AI to tell you
- 17:24which doctor is the best answer.
- 17:27You know? Yes. It you know, it it
- 17:29it's not it it's it's not hard to
- 17:31say, look. In this in this market,
- 17:34here are three
- 17:36potential configurations
- 17:37for your network to be to meet your
- 17:40business objectives.
- 17:41And so the technology can help you do
- 17:44that,
- 17:45you know, get you to three or four
- 17:46different scenarios faster.
- 17:48But there's gonna be an expert who's gonna
- 17:50look at those scenarios and and evaluate them
- 17:53for sort of the the things
- 17:55static model or and kind of an agent's
- 17:58not gonna get to.
- 17:59So I think there's, yes, there's something about
- 18:01more
- 18:02insight faster for people through some of the
- 18:05Genentech stuff. But the second part I think
- 18:07is really important, which is workflow.
- 18:10I think, the AI stuff is gonna be
- 18:13really, really transformative in helping take
- 18:15content from one end of the organization
- 18:18and move it rapidly to the other side
- 18:20and say, hey. You may not know this
- 18:23yet, but here's what happened with this market.
- 18:26You've got an emerging gap or
- 18:28this organization
- 18:29has changed,
- 18:31its affiliations, and now you've got sort of
- 18:33competitive issue. Here are three choices. What do
- 18:36you wanna do about that? The ability to
- 18:38get that content across the organization fast,
- 18:41really powerful.
- 18:43Yeah. Excellent. Yeah. Truly, truly able to conceptualize
- 18:47just how powerful that would be for an
- 18:48organization. For, ultimately, for for for for members.
- 18:51There's just so many different benefits that could
- 18:53come from that sort of vision of the
- 18:55future.
- 18:56Is there anything, Steve, we didn't touch on
- 18:58our conversation today that you wanna make sure
- 19:01to to leave listeners with? Maybe it's something
- 19:03you wanna reemphasize or a fresh point. I
- 19:05kinda leave it to you. But how do
- 19:07you how do you wanna close out today?
- 19:09So, look,
- 19:10you know, Brian, we started with this comment
- 19:12about how it's a complicated time and it's
- 19:15a real challenge and the margin pressure.
- 19:17I think, you know, I'm really excited. I
- 19:21see people at all these organizations
- 19:23facing real difficulty, but also facing it with
- 19:26some optimism.
- 19:27I'm really motivated
- 19:30by the meaningful
- 19:32kind of creativity,
- 19:33the innovation,
- 19:35the changes that I'm hearing from our clients
- 19:38and, you know, around the ecosystem, providers,
- 19:41payers,
- 19:42regulators,
- 19:43and there's a real optimism. It may not
- 19:45feel that way, but I think people are
- 19:48looking at the future saying it could be
- 19:49great. And I'm really excited. I know I've
- 19:52got hundreds of people here at Quest that
- 19:53are excited about sort of the the power
- 19:57of what's ahead. So
- 19:59put it all together. It you know, we
- 20:00can help hundreds of millions of Americans get
- 20:03better health care.
- 20:04Well, Steve, it really was a pleasure and
- 20:06truly appreciate you ending on that that optimistic
- 20:09note. I think,
- 20:11important for all of us to get healthy
- 20:12doses of of optimism these days. Thank you
- 20:14so much for coming on the podcast, Steve.
- 20:16We also wanna thank our podcast sponsor, Quest
- 20:18Analytics.
- 20:19You can tune in to more podcasts from
- 20:20Becker's Healthcare by visiting our podcast page at
- 20:24beckershospitalreview.com.