After blazing a new trail for employee healthcare, Brian DeVore is leaving Intel to pursue a career in strategic consulting.
“It has been a great ride, and I’m proud that we’ve driven a different conversation between buyer and seller in healthcare as a result of new thinking, new engagement and heightened expectations,” DeVore, Intel’s director of healthcare ecosystem and strategy, told colleagues yesterday. “I am moving into strategic consulting where I look to extend what we’ve done at Intel with other medium to large employers. If you’re contemplating new and innovative ideas, I’d love to discuss what you’re thinking.”
DeVore intends to remain on the Oregon Health Policy Board, the policymaking and oversight body for the Oregon Health Authority, a positon he’s held since 2012.
At Intel for the past 10 years, DeVore championed a novel approach that bypasses insurance companies, and, instead, relies on a select network of physicians and hospitals from Providence and Kaiser, while keeping its eyes on the population who use the majority of healthcare services – the chronically ill – and not losing sight of member satisfaction.
“We go direct to the provider system in a collaborative fashion,” DeVore said. “Our goal is to get the members tied into a primary care team and get out of the way, let them practice medicine. We don’t have an insurance company in the mix. It frees them up to do what they need to do.”
Earlier, Intel had tried to hold down escalating healthcare costs with onsite clinics, high deductible plans and other efforts to encourage wellness -- “none of that worked,”DeVore said in an earlier interview. “The chronic sick never go to wellness stuff. “All the stuff we rolled out didn’t drive costs down,” DeVore said. “It created a door to go through. When there are too many doors, they shut down. It’s too confusing. It’s game over and the answer is to sit still and not think about your health.”
Instead, Intel “cajoled, cheered, asked, pleaded” with insurers to get quality of care up and costs down. Then Intel considered its own “lean methodology – get rid of what doesn’t create value.”
This isn’t the first attempt by the computer chip maker to shake up the delivery system. In January 2013, it unveiled a similar project in New Mexico for its 5,400 employees that’s projected to save between $8 and $10 million through 2017. Intel’s initiative to slow spending and improve health in New Mexico was very similar to previous efforts, said DeVore. “I think we've done what most employers have done. We realized that wasn't going to bend the trend.”
DeVore was recognized for improving employee healthcare by Intel in May, receiving its achievement which acknowledged that his efforts helped Intel avoid several hundred million dollars in total cost, and established the chipmaker as a leader in employer-sponsored healthcare.
In Oregon, Intel has 7,500 employees and their 33,000 dependents, Diane can be reached at [email protected].
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