For Indiana non-profit Bosma Enterprises, an unwavering mission to help employees lead healthier lives

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For more than 100 years, Bosma Enterprises has led the way in fulfilling its mission to support and serve Indiana’s citizens who are blind and visually impaired, serving nearly a thousand clients each year. Programs range from counseling and support to job training and skills development to help adults stay self-sufficient. It also operates a production, warehouse and fulfillment business that provides employment opportunities for employees with vision loss that may not otherwise be available because they face a 70-percent unemployment rate.

And although its workforce is unique – more than half of its employees experience low vision, the challenges that Bosma faces as a healthcare benefits provider are familiar to many employers: Rising healthcare costs, the increasing prevalence and cost impacts of chronic conditions such as diabetes and the need to help employees gain better access to more convenient healthcare.

Addressing cost by giving employees more

To help counteract these factors, Bosma selected OurHealth as its near-site primary clinic provider for medical plan members. Through the partnership, employees and dependents can access primary care and other healthcare services via OurHealth’s network of seven Indianapolis-area MyClinics, including MyClinic @ Traders Point, which is only about 10 minutes from Bosma Enterprises headquarters on Indianapolis’ northwest side.

 

Image courtesy of Bosma Enterprises.
“The partnership with OurHealth is a perfect example of where we can do something that is going to make it easier for our employees to get services and maintain their health,” Matlock says.

 

“We felt it might help us address the rising healthcare costs that we were experiencing as everybody else is,” says Senior Benefits Manager Joseph Matlock. “We want to help our employees maintain their health in any way we can. The other part of it was convenience and just how much easier is it if you are not feeling well when there’s a near-site clinic that you can just run to during the day versus having to get an appointment then set up your transportation for three or four days later, or having to find somebody to take you to the clinic. We felt it was a benefit we can add as far as the things that we offer to show our employees that we value them.”

The accessibility of a primary care provider where employees could receive help managing and reducing the impact of chronic conditions such as diabetes – a leading cause of blindness and vision loss – were also important factors, Matlock says.

More than just convenient healthcare

Not only does Bosma help employees access convenient healthcare, but they also help ensure employees make it to their appointments as transportation can be especially challenging for people with low vision or blindness. When and if an employee schedules a clinic appointment during work hours, Bosma provides free transportation to the clinic, helping employees keep their appointment and stay on track with preventive healthcare. The firm also encourages healthy behaviors with a wellness incentive program that encourages regular preventive primary care, vision and dental care check-ups and other amenities, including a recently opened onsite fitness center.

“We just think that as a company who cares about their employees, we want to provide the best opportunities,” Matlock says. “The partnership with OurHealth is a perfect example of where we can do something that is going to make it easier for our employees to get services and maintain their health.”

Global auto manufacturer partners with OurHealth to improve employee quality of life

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KYB Americas is the world’s largest supplier of OEM shocks and struts and considers Toyota, Subaru, Honda, Nissan and Mitsubishi as its main customers. KYB also has a huge aftermarket business supplying automotive parts to retailers like Advance Auto Parts and O’Reilly’s.

At the company’s 500,000-square-foot operation just south of Indianapolis in Franklin, Ind., more than 700 associates produce as many as 5,000 parts every day. Recruiting and retaining hard-working assemblymen and women and machinists is critical to maintaining their output, and company leadership saw the addition of an onsite primary care clinic as a great way to retain their edge on a global playing field. Read more

For Family-owned Bank, Giving Employees More is Giving Back

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For Centier Bank, the choice to give its associates primary care services via an onsite clinic came down to one reason: Family.

Founded in 1895, Centier is Indiana’s largest, private family-owned financial institution and the idea of family permeates every aspect of the organization’s culture, says Chrisanne Christ, Senior Partner in Human Resource Development.

That culture has earned the Merrillville, Ind.-based bank the Indiana Chamber of Commerce’s “Best Places to Work” designation 12 years in a row, as well as fierce loyalty from its employees, many of whom spend professional careers spanning decades working for Centier.

Christ says that familial independence and strong focus on the best interest of its employees were key factors in bringing onsite healthcare to the organization more than five years ago. “We’re not strictly about the bottom line,” Christ says. “We have to make a profit of course – we have to be competitive, we have to be strategic – but we always make sure our decisions are right for our associates.”

Christ says she became aware of the option of onsite healthcare more than a decade ago. “What was appealing about it was the convenience of bringing healthcare to you versus having to make an appointment,” she says. “[When you make an appointment], then you go wait in the doctor’s office, then once you get seen, you have to get a prescription filled somewhere else – you would have to take a half to whole day off just to go the doctor, and that’s not even if you’re sick.

Chrisanne Christ, Centier Bank

“Making healthcare convenient means busy people will more readily take advantage of it.  Then add that it’s free, and it becomes a superior, unique benefit.”

Centier utilizes an OurHealth onsite clinic at its Merrillville headquarters, OurClinic @ Centier, providing accessible primary care to all of its full and part time employees. It saw initial success engaging employees with these services, so then partnered with other like-minded local employers to build a second OurHealth Clinic in nearby Valparaiso, Ind. to be shared amongst all of their employees. Most recently, after successfully expanding its presence in the Indianapolis metro area, it provided associates with access to care providers at OurHealth’s Indianapolis network of seven MyClinic locations.

And it’s not just employees or dependents on the health plan. “We made it available to every single aassociate – everyone gets to use it so it truly becomes an associate benefit,” she says. “We didn’t want any associate to not have it.”

That benefit was an ideal fit for Centier Bank for a number of other reasons, too, Christ says:

  • A Like-minded Partner: “When we do business, it’s much more effective to work with a like-minded partner, with a culture that’s similar to ours. When we met with Jeff Wells and Ben Evans (OurHealth’s co-founders), they were very sincere about why they were building the business – it wasn’t just about making money,” Christ says. “If you’re doing business the right way, that should be a byproduct.”
  • Network Independence – Christ also notes that OurHealth’s network-neutral positioning and independence as a healthcare provider was an advantage compared to clinic providers from larger provider groups or hospital systems who may be incented to act as an exclusive referral source. “I didn’t want our associates to feel like they were just going to be referred into a particular system automatically,” Christ says. “I liked that independence.”
  • Stronger, Longer-term Provider-Patient Relationships – Christ says the appeal of OurHealth’s clinic model included the deeper relationships a provider can establish with their patients. “The model is all about getting to know the patient and their health,” she says. “By having healthcare that’s available when you need it, and having longer appointments, they’re really getting to know you as a patient.”

 The Results

“The No. 1 reinforcement that we made the right decision are the testimonials,” Christ says. She mentions that from preventing the risk of stroke or heart attacks to early detection of cancer, the stories she hears from associates run the gamut. “If had a nickel for every time someone said, ‘If the clinic hadn’t been there…’ – hearing those stories is all we need.”