DENVER — To explain the near fallouts between health care providers and insurance carriers in Colorado this year, Courtney Hutchison tells her clients to imagine asking for a raise.
"If you haven't received a raise in a decade, you're going to ask for a pretty big one, because it might be another decade before you get the next one," said Hutchison, Colorado market president for insurance agency the MJ Companies.
Contract renegotiations like the one that stalled in September between HCA HealthOne and United Healthcare often go unnoticed. But those businesses, like many around the county, are under mounting financial pressure.
Agreements with health insurers often last for several years — even a decade — so health systems are aiming now to make up for the losses they sustained during the pandemic and to win financial security for future years, Hutchison said.
Those multiyear contract renegotiations are part of the reason why medical costs tend to trail general inflation, health industry experts say. The contracts and other factors are showing up this open enrollment season, increasing health insurance costs for many Colorado employers.
> Read the full story at the Denver Business Journal.
