Penn Health Advantage

The Opportunity

Health care is one of the most important and complex components of employee experience.

Penn already offers generous health benefits, yet our employees often encounter friction in accessing and receiving care. Common challenges include delays in primary and specialty care, administrative friction in scheduling and referrals, difficulty navigating the health system, and confusion about cost and coverage. These issues are not unique to Penn, but they are increasingly out of step with expectations for convenience, transparency, and coordination.

At the same time, Penn has a distinctive advantage over other employers in general and its peers in higher education in particular. As a self-insured employer with an embedded world-class, integrated health system, Penn can align benefits and clinical services in support of employee goals in ways most institutions cannot.

The opportunity is to move beyond incremental improvements and create a more coordinated model that makes high-quality care easier to access, more affordable, and better aligned to the needs of Penn employees and their families.

Vision

Penn Health Advantage envisions a more employee-centered health care experience that better meets the needs of Penn employees and their families.

We currently envision four complementary elements:

• Easier access. Ensuring employees can get timely primary, specialty, and urgent care—both in-person and virtually.
• Greater affordability and alignment. Redesigning benefits to make high-quality care more convenient and less costly.
• Coordination and navigation. Connecting care across services, with clear pathways and support at each step.
• Continuous data-driven improvement. Using insights from utilization and outcomes to improve care, reduce costs, and strengthen the overall experience.

Emerging Design

Penn is exploring a set of specific initiatives aligned to the vision—some underway, others under consideration—to build and scale this model.

Improve access to high-quality care

• Establish dedicated pathways for Penn employees to access primary and specialty care.
• Expand appointment availability and reduce wait times through optimized access lanes.
• Scale 24/7 virtual care through Penn Medicine OnDemand.
• Explore physical access points or on-campus care models.

Align benefits to make care more affordable and effective

• Design benefits so that in-system care is even more affordable and convenient, while preserving choice.
• Introduce targeted incentives across imaging, procedures, and specialty pharmacy.
• Expand drug coverage and reduce out-of-pocket costs.
• Model impacts on employee costs, utilization, and total plan spend.

Create a seamless navigation and care experience

• Establish a welcoming “front door” for employees, integrating virtual care, scheduling, and navigation.
• Improve coordination across services and ensure smoother transitions between care settings.
• Expand and better integrate mental health services with clearer entry points; improve coordination between physical and behavioral care, and reduce out-of-pocket costs for employees.

Existing Foundation

Penn has a strong foundation to build on:

• A world-class, integrated health system: Penn Medicine provides leading clinical care across primary, specialty, and virtual services.
• Comprehensive employee health benefits: Penn offers broad coverage across medical, behavioral health, pharmacy, and wellness services.
• A self-insured model with flexibility to innovate: Penn can design benefits and incentives that better align cost, quality, and experience.
• Established virtual and mental health infrastructure: Services such as Penn Medicine OnDemand and Penn Cobalt provide 24/7 access and a proven foundation to scale models already used successfully within the health system.

• Strong operational and data capabilities: Penn has world-class programs in health economics and is equipped to use data more effectively to improve employee experience.

  Leads

• David Asch, Senior Vice President for Strategic Initiatives
• Mark Dingfield, Executive Vice President
• Felicia Washington, Vice President of Human Resources