Clever Care Health Plan CEO Karen Walker Johnson, BSN, thinks her company’s edge is one that bigger insurers might have trouble replicating.
That edge is Clever Care’s focus on offering “culturally sensitive Medicare options,” and it is baked into the company’s mission statement. In an interview with Becker’s, Ms. Walker Johnson teased out why bigger insurers — often with more robust resources — struggle to compete.
She said that larger plans are “trying to appeal to such a broad audience,” which can limit them from adopting a “concierge-like” focus for certain demographics.
“There have been large players — national players — who have attempted to do what we’re doing, quite frankly, and they haven’t necessarily been very successful at it,” Ms. Walker Johnson said. “It’s easier for a smaller plan to do this because you have to really be able to get close to and really listen to your customer.”
Along with pairing Eastern and Western medicine, Ms. Walker Johnson said Clever Care communicates with members directly in their primary language, rather than going through a separate translator. She said, in her experience, transferring to a translator can lead to inefficiencies and details falling through the cracks. Nuances in formal and conversational dialogue can be another challenge for assisting older members, too, something Ms. Walker Johnson said factors into reviewing translated materials.
“We knew that by [engaging with new members in their primary language], that would take just one piece of that frustration away that sometimes can get in the way of people wanting to access healthcare,” she said. “One of the lessons learned is just to be proactive, if you will, as a plan, rather than being reactive.”
While the federal government has been cracking down on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives over the past year, Ms. Walker Johnson said she does not think health plans focused on catering to diverse segments have this worry top of mind. Instead, she sees cultural competence as a business imperative, especially for more tailored plans. She said that if insurers cannot meet a member’s unique needs, “they’re going to lose market share.”
“For plans like us and plans that are similar to us, there’s a real opportunity,” she said. “We can scale, but we’re scaling with the insights and the benefits of a smaller plan who’s working side by side with providers … and with seniors to really get the insights that are needed to make sure that we’re actually meeting their expectations.”
