Business of Life

More Health Plans Embrace Alternative Medicine

The Wall St Journal (subscription only) today in In Health Plans Embrace Alternatives reports that more employers are offering coverage for alternative care

About 47% of employees with health benefits had acupuncture coverage in 2004, up from 33% in 2002, according to a 3,000-employer survey released earlier this month by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Health Research and Educational Trust. Chiropractic coverage increased to 87% from 79% of workers with health benefits, the survey showed....
Still, the increases in coverage for acupuncture and chiropractic care are part of a trend over the past decade in which alternative medicine has gone more mainstream while more employers have come to see the option as, at the least, a relatively low-cost addition to benefits packages....
"There are some employers out there who are saying, 'No new benefits of any type,' " says George DeVries, chief executive of American Specialty Health Plans Inc., which offers alternative coverage that is added to traditional insurance policies. "But there are many employers who are saying, 'Adding a low-cost [benefit] actually helps us in a time when we're increasing deductibles and co-pays and coinsurance.'