Partner with a medical scheme that offers smart benefit structuring.

So many boxes to tick, so little time. Sound familiar?

We live in an era where there is an abundance of choice and medical schemes are no different. While this means you have options when it comes to choosing the right medical scheme to partner with your organisation, it can also lead to noise and confusion in the decision making process.

In addition to this, some of the most attractive looking medical scheme benefits give the impression of adding value and appeal to a purchase that your people cannot do without, but leave you with questions around their true value.

Aligning with a brand that you know your team can count on while making offerings accessible and user friendly simplifies matters, helping you to not only get the job done but to get it done well. How? The answer lies in how benefits are structured and for whom.

Wellness and preventative benefits, for example, promote healthier behaviour such as staying up to date with health checks, making wise dietary decisions and incorporating physical activity into daily life. This can provide employees and their beneficiaries with positive long term health benefits while increased levels of wellness have the potential to enhance workplace performance and improve morale.    

Such benefits are nowadays expected in one form or another at certain levels, however, when they are richly comprehensive across all your organisation’s medical scheme options and are paid from the scheme’s risk pool, leaving employees’ essential cover and savings untouched – that is when your company can start to truly feel the difference.

After all, your team is most likely made up of people living through different stages of life, from the carefree newbie making their junior debut in the working world, to the people trying to balance work life with parenthood and the highly experienced leaders of the group. Naturally, you require different options that meet these varying healthcare needs along with ensured access to outstanding wellness and preventative benefits for all.

Start with good basics

First and foremost, your company needs a partner in healthcare you can trust. Look, therefore, for a scheme that has a long track record and is known for being enduring, reliable and financially sound, with a wide range of modular offerings rich in benefits that back your people with the cover they really need, from day-to-day benefits that make a real difference and sound in-hospital cover to unlimited oncology.

Realistic for the budget

The ideal medical scheme will be cognisant of the increasing need to cater for constrained budgets and will have designed all its benefit options with true value for money in mind, while offering efficiency discounts that translate to savings of up to 25% in contributions when choosing network partners. If the scheme is an industry leader in preventative and wellness benefits that are not only practical and user friendly but offer choice – all done without breaking the bank – so much the better.

Meeting the needs of the new generation medical scheme member

The complex nature of medical scheme options and the distinctive needs of new talent entering the workforce have required a serious relook at the way medical scheme products are structured.

A scheme that is in touch with the needs of members understands the importance of delivering on a broad spectrum of product options ranging from primary healthcare and hospital cover to traditional and flexible savings options.

Again, your ideal choice will be known not only for providing some of the most affordable options on the market, but also for innovative design and comprehensive benefits. They will understand the value of a holistic healthcare approach that is focused on preventing illness while promoting health accessibility to every member of the team, at every stage of life, independent of the availability of day-to-day benefits.

Smart structuring

How seriously would you expect your medical scheme partner to be in finding ways to add value for your company? Look therefore for a scheme that covers all wellness benefits entirely from risk for all members across the board so that no other medical scheme benefits are affected – a solutions-focused approach that extracts maximum value for both your organisation and its employees.

This should be over and above the preventative benefits that are so essential to empowering members to take control of their health, such as women’s health screenings including mammograms, pap smears and oral contraception among others, and for men, that prostate check and PSA blood test that is so vital for the early detection and treatment of prostate cancer.

Personalised wellness for all

To begin with, supporting and strengthening the wellness of your employees may be more easily achieved with a medical scheme that delivers personalised attention, such as  outstanding physical activity benefits done in consultation with a registered biokineticist to help design the right fitness plan for each individual and to monitor their progress.

Other desirable benefits to look for are a Fitness Assessment and Exercise Prescription benefit for use at an accredited facility, an Exercise from Home benefit, a Kids Active benefit and a Pregnancy Fitness benefit. These will not only give all of your people the fitness support they need but that support is tailored to their stage of life and preferences, no matter which option plan they are on.

Likewise, a nutritional assessment and healthy eating plan in consultation with a registered dietitian will go a long way in supporting members wherever they may be on their wellness journey. Three further superb benefits in this regard include a Nutritional Assessment and Healthy Eating Plan benefit, a Pregnancy Nutritional benefit and a Kids Nutritional benefit.

Something for working moms and dads

Family healthcare needs are ever present and a key driver in healthcare decision making for companies with parents on the payroll. Recognising the demand for exceptional kids’ benefits that surpass basic baby wellness and childhood immunisations with benefits such as school readiness assessments, pre-school eye, hearing and dental screening, occupational therapy assessments, specialised exercise programmes and tailored healthy eating plans, and unlimited GP visits for children under the age of six with basic dentistry once day-to-day benefits are depleted, means that busy parents who form an important part of your team feel supported in taking family health to greater heights than ever before.

Mental health matters

And, as those in human resources know only too well, a holistic picture of wellness must include attention to mental health – particularly when it comes to high functioning teams in the demanding and competitive world of commerce. Providing healthcare cover that includes an unlimited, round the clock psychosocial counselling helpline as well as a number of face-to-face sessions when needed can be a lifeline to those taking strain and lets your people know that you care about them.    

Imagine the difference it could make to have a medical scheme that has already done all this work for you by structuring wellness and preventative benefits so that they are paid from a risk pool, providing equal access from the top down, unlike so many offerings on the market where richness and payment structure vary at different levels.

In this day and age, where tangible value and ease of use are top of mind for everyone, creating true benefit richness from risk simply makes sense.

Josua Joubert is Chief Executive and Principal Officer at CompCare Medical Scheme.