By Lou Gianquinto, President, Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield in Connecticut
Health insurance is one of the largest line items on companies’ balance sheets and a critical factor in workforce stability. As costs and expectations rise, employers and employees want a simpler, more integrated healthcare experience. Yet for many, navigating healthcare still feels fragmented, time-consuming, and overwhelming – from finding the right care provider to understanding benefits and costs to scheduling appointments.
As employers compete for talent and work to keep employees healthy and engaged, access to healthcare must better reflect how people live and work. Employers are also looking for solutions that lower the total cost of care while improving the overall experience for their employees. The future isn’t fully virtual or entirely in-person, but hybrid: seamlessly combining digital tools, virtual support, and in‑person care with greater speed, precision, and connectivity.
We see this shift firsthand with the members we serve. Our goal is to help them spend less time managing care and more time focused on work and life, while helping lower their cost of healthcare and simplify how they navigate the system.
Why hybrid healthcare is a business imperative
Today’s healthcare system was largely designed around in-person visits, which no longer aligns with modern schedules or expectations. When nearly two-thirds of hourly workers receive schedules week to week, care requiring long wait times and limited appointments doesn’t work for employees or their employers.
Hybrid healthcare addresses this gap by combining digital tools, virtual care, and in-person services into a simpler experience. This includes more integrated approaches across medical, pharmacy, and behavioral health benefits. This makes it easier for people to access support quickly, identify needs earlier, avoid unnecessary office visits, and get the right level of care when they need it. For employers, that translates to fewer disruptions during the workday, better employee engagement, and lower costs tied to missed work or delayed care.
When care is connected, people are more likely to stay on top of preventive care, better manage chronic conditions, and reduce avoidable costs.
Using technology to simplify and personalize care
A Harris Poll survey found that people spend eight hours a month coordinating care – time most employees don’t have. At Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, our focus is on making healthcare easier to navigate by using technology to help remove barriers, simplify decisions, save time, and support earlier, more personalized interventions.
For our members in Connecticut, we support this model in several ways:
- A single digital front door: Through our Sydney Health app, members can find in‑network providers, check benefits, estimate costs, and schedule appointments in one place.
- Personalized guidance: Digital tools help surface relevant information and recommended next steps based on an individual’s needs and strengthen decision-making with data-driven insights.
- Proactive support: By combining data with outreach like app notifications, text messages, or emails, we can engage people earlier with more personalized support for preventive services, medication reminders, or chronic condition resources.
We’re also investing in systems that allow health information to appropriately and securely move more easily across the care continuum. Connecting data gives providers better visibility into their patients’ health, frees employees from repeating information and tracking down answers, and reduces administrative complexity.
Why interoperability matters
Hybrid care only works when information can follow the individual. Without that connectivity, hybrid care can create fragmented experiences, delays in care, and unnecessary complexity for employees trying to navigate the system. When this happens, employees spend more time managing their care, face avoidable delays, and are more likely to postpone treatment, leading to higher costs and more disruption during the workday.
Interoperability helps make those transitions seamless by creating a simpler, more integrated experience, in turn reducing repeated questions, duplicative tests, and avoidable delays. For employers, those inefficiencies show up as real costs – in higher healthcare spending and employees spending more time away from work managing care instead of receiving it.
When information moves more seamlessly, providers can make more informed decisions quicker, enabling earlier intervention and better coordination across care settings. In 2024 alone, the U.S. healthcare system avoided an estimated $258 billion in administrative costs through electronic transactions and improved data exchange. Through Health OS, our digital interoperability platform, we’re connecting data from the various corners of healthcare to give care providers and consumers a more complete view of a person’s health and healthcare, helping to create a more integrated healthcare experience.
Raising expectations for the healthcare experience
People expect healthcare to fit into their lives. Meeting that expectation requires a connected, flexible approach that seamlessly blends technology with in-person care. Smarter, more connected care approaches can improve the cost of care, simplify the healthcare experience, improve outcomes, and support a healthier, more productive, workforce – creating more opportunity for Connecticut businesses.
Learn more at anthem.com/healthcareinconnecticut.
