In the US, many health insurance plans now include wellness benefits such as discounted gym memberships, access to commercial weight loss programmes and classes in nutrition and wellbeing, in order to control escalating medical spending due to the health consequences of obesity. However, a new study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine has found that although medical spending hit an estimated at $147 billion in 2008, and most overweight adults agree that weight loss-promoting health insurance benefits are a good idea, they don’t want to pay extra for them.
Study author Marian Jarlenski, a PhD candidate at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health referred to an earlier study in which is was found that wellness benefits are estimated to save $3.27 in medical costs for every $1 spent. ‘Prior research has shown that wellness benefits can successfully change health behaviours and reduce medical spending,’ she said.
National survey responses from 600 overweight and obese adults were analysed for Jarlenski’s study, in which participants were asked whether weight loss benefits offered through their health insurance would be helpful and if they were willing to pay extra for such benefits. The researchers discovered that 83% of respondents noted a specific helpful benefit, with 27% listing gym memberships as helpful and 16% noting the benefits of commercial weight loss programmes. However, 66% of those participants said that were unwilling to pay extra for them.
Jarlenski explained, ‘Without asking more detailed follow-up questions, we can’t know with certainty why respondents were not willing to pay more for benefits they said would be helpful. A lower willingness to pay might indicate a less robust level of support for the benefits.’ She and the other study authors concluded that wellness benefits should be offered to all individuals as they are proven to be effective for saving medical costs and reducing the risk of health complications.
According to Paul Fishman, PhD, a senior investigator specializing in health services and economics at Group Health Research Institute, health insurers are reluctant to offer weight loss benefits because many employers are not convinced that there is a direct return on investment. He commented, ‘We know that obesity raises health care costs, but what we haven’t shown convincingly over time is the causal effect that providing the benefit to wellness and preventive programmes got people to use the benefit, then change their behaviour and then save insurers money.’
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