Hey, Remember IPAs, PPOs and TPAs?

by Gregg A. Masters, MPH

In a last man standing of sorts in what some may call the legacy and aging infrastructure of the ‘vote with your feet‘ PPO industry including it’s allies in the TPA (Third Party Administrator) space, the American Association of Payors, Administrators and Networks (AAPAN) is holding its 2016 Annual Forum in my former hometown of Dana Point, California at the Ritz Carlton, Laguna Nigel.

The mission of American Association of Payors, Administrators and Networks (AAPAN) notes it provides:

According to its subsidiary the American Association of Preferred Provider Organizations (AAPPO) the ‘PPO chassis’ accounts for:

An estimated 200 million Americans, or about 81 percent of all Americans with health care coverage (excluding those receiving military health care), receive their health care services through a PPO delivery system.

As a ‘collaborative association’ on behalf of the PPO industry initially positioned as a complementary (if not an HMO-lite) alternative to the more aggressive gatekeeper HMO option (see history of managed care era in graphic), AAPAN has a track record of success from advocacy, to thought leadership and operating best practices and solutions.

The Association aligns two potentially silo-ed (though synergistic) interests: the American Association of PPOs (AAPPO), the Third Party Administrators Association of America (TPAAA). For an issue brief on valued based healthcare and the need for network standards, see: The Need to Standardize Network Value-Based Purchasing Requirements.

So one might say, though a larger share of the employer based insurance market remains in a PPO type (vs. HMO) benefit plan design their role and industry leadership visibility may have been somewhat muted (if not, absent from the health reform narrative) since the rollout of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and it’s emphasis on Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) dominated the reform narrative.

AAPAN intends to raise this profile and remind many in the space that PPOs, TPAs and even IPAs (Independent Practice Associations) have a material and meaningful role to play in enabling the triple aim even if their initiatives aren’t tagged ACOs per se.

The 2016 Forum hashtag is #AAPAN16, and the digital dashboard is here. Do follow the tweetstream for thought leadership insights from key industry executives, entrepreneurs and change agents. See keynotes and sessions here, including Health Innovation Media co-host, Douglas Goldstein aka @eFuturist.

The program schedule is here.