Episode #195 Taking Healthcare from Kmart to Amazon with Robert Andrews, CEO, Health Transformation Alliance (HTA)

Rob Andrews currently serves as the CEO of the Health Transformation Alliance (HTA). The HTA member companies collectively are responsible for more than 8 million employees, dependents, and retirees with an annual healthcare spend of $30+ billion. Through Andrews’ leadership, the HTA has launched value-driven solutions specifically designed to improve patient care and add economic value through world-class data and analytics, pathbreaking pharmaceutical solutions, high-quality medical networks, and robust consumer engagement initiatives. To date, the cooperative has saved its member companies well over $2 billion in healthcare costs. Prior to joining HTA, Rob served as a Member of the United States House of RepresentativesUpon his departure from Congress, President Barack Obama praised Andrews’ service as “an original author of the Affordable Care Act…and a vital partner in its passage and implementation.” 

In our conversation today, Rob and I revisit what feels now like an age-old argument – the move to value-based care, that is, incentivizing outcomes over the number of patients seen or services provided. What’s unique here is that for the past decade, the HTA has been working with its member constituents to demonstrate that this approach is not only economically feasible, but also better for employees and their families. 

Rob points out that while HTA members are certainly interested in lowering healthcare costs, their most immediate concern is employee recruitment and retention. Robust healthcare benefits packages play an important role in being able to attract and keep good talent, so members are invested in being able to provide the most competitive plans and pricing.

Rob believes, and I agree, that healthcare is going to have to become less like Kmart and more like Amazon – what you want delivered in a way that’s convenient and affordable. Pulling together the collective power of these large employers is one way to nudge the market in that direction.