Powerful new model to predict the future health needs of Medibank customers
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Medibank is leading the way in supporting the health of Australians through a model it has developed to predict and prevent health issues of its customers. From early 2017 Medibank will reach out to customers it identifies as likely to have high preventable health needs over the next 12 months to proactively offer support.
The model can accurately predict 42 percent of customers who will go on to make potentially preventable claims of more than $10,000 in the next 12 months. Calculating over 750 variables using the latest cloud-based technology, the model boasts an accuracy as good as or better than international benchmarks.
In its testing phase, the model identified around 7,000 customers in 2015 most likely to have the highest potentially preventable healthcare needs in the future. Nearly half turned out to make at least one potentially preventable claim in the following 12 months.
Medibank’s General Manager of Member Health, Rebecca Bell, says the model is a win/win for customers and Medibank.
“The power of the model is the profound impact it can have on a customer’s health and quality of life, helping them to stay out of hospital and avoid the stress that goes along with this,” Ms Bell said.
“For Medibank, the model will let us provide a more personalised service for our customers, while also helping to reduce preventable health claims and taking pressure off premiums and the healthcare system more broadly.”
Ms Bell went on to say that the model will harness existing programs that the company has in place to help customers most in need.
“Medibank provides a range of support to many of our customers with high health needs through our CareComplete programs,” she said.
“We’re excited to be able to harness these in a way that goes one step further by engaging customers earlier to help them stay as healthy as possible and fend off negative health events that can be potentially prevented through early intervention.”
Medibank will start contacting individual customers it identifies via the model from early 2017.
