Health insurance premiums paid by workers and their employers rose an average of 6.1 percent this year, outpacing inflation and pay increases and taking a bigger chunk out of families' budgets, according to a new survey.
The Kaiser Family Foundation study doesn't provide state-by-state breakdowns. But other sources show the increase in Indiana was much higher.
In Indiana the cost of private health insurance for a family has jumped an average of more than 10 percent a year over the past six years. From 2000 to 2006, the total increase was 77 percent, with worker-paid premiums going from $1,319 to $2,495 and the company-paid portion rising from $5,309 to $9,219, according to Families USA.
According to Kaiser, premiums for employer- sponsored health insurance for the average family topped $12,000 - with employees picking up about one-fourth of that cost - although the increase in premiums slowed for a fourth straight year.
Many of the more than 3,000 companies surveyed said they plan to make significant changes to their health plans and benefits, and nearly half said they are very or somewhat likely to raise premiums.
This year, the largest health benefits company in Indiana, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, has seen health-care costs for its plans rise more than 7 percent, said spokesman Jim Kappel. The company hasn't yet firmed up the exact number.
As healthcosts continue rising, Anthem and its parent, Indianapolis-based WellPoint, have cut costs in part by using national contracts with high-volume, lower-cost laboratories and other health providers, and by targeting high-cost medical procedures for cost cuts, said Bob McIntire, senior vice president of health-care management at WellPoint.
When medical imaging costs, like brain scans and basic X-rays, began rising a few years ago for its members, WellPoint drew up clinical guidelines to reduce the number of unnecessary tests, McIntire said. Now WellPoint sees little to no increase in imaging costs for members, he said.
Another large insurer, UnitedHealthcare, said that Indiana's health-care costs remain slightly higher than the national average, but that efforts to reduce costs are paying off.
Cost-cutting is working because "employees are becoming more involved in the health-care process," while health plans are steering members to doctors who provide higher-quality service at competitive rates, said Dan Krajnovich, chief executive of UnitedHealthcare in Indiana.
The 6.1 percent increase in premiums for families is the lowest growth rate since 1999, when U.S. premiums rose 5.3 percent. Health-care premiums rose 7.7 percent last year.
The survey showed wages rose an average of 3.7 percent and inflation grew by 2.6 percent.
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