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The rising cost of employee healthcare has been a hot topic lately. Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JP Morgan’s plan to join together to combat the rising costs sprung a lot of chatter about what will work, and what wont. Maybe these three should take some pointers from Cleveland Clinic.

Cleveland Clinic is a hospital network in Florida, Nevada and Ohio that is internationally known for their expertise and quality of care. Dr. Toby Cosgrove, former president and CEO and current executive advisor of the Cleveland Clinic spoke to LinkedIn about how he was able to reduce employee healthcare costs.

Population Health

The first thing the Cleveland Clinic did was promote population health. The hospital network started a program of wellness thinking that it would ultimately result in a healthier population that would cost less. They stopped firing smokers, swapped for healthier food options, and offered free weight management programs.

Disease Management

Second, they looked at disease management. Cleveland Clinic offered a financial incentive for people who had hypertension, high cholesterol, diabetes, asthma and who are overweight or smoke to enter into disease management.

So what were the results? Dr. Cosgrove told LinkedIn, “we have seen for the people in disease management a 20% reduction in emergency room visits and a 20% reduction in hospitalizations. One other thing we saw [was] a 28% reduction in sick days.”