BCBS Minnesota Ready to Roll on Gamification

Gamification has been a staple of health insurers' customer engagement strategies for quite a while. Many companies in the field have mature gamified platforms that aim to improve health outcomes through incentivizing and rewards.

The latest insurer to do so is Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota (BCBSMN), which recently completed a pilot of Change Healthcare's Healthcare University platform, which uses "videos, quizzes, games and game mechanics to make benefits education easy and impactful, to teach consumers how their benefits work and how to make value-based healthcare decisions," according to the company.

BCBSMN piloted Healthcare University with its own employees, with a goal of onboarding 20% of that group. Registration exceeded that by 90%, though, with each user completing on average eight courses covering subjects like health insurance basics, benefits selection and billing. The insurer now plans to introduce the platform to its members during the upcoming open-enrollment period.

"Change Healthcare's unique approach to benefits education has allowed us to maximize engagement with our employees and ensure they are prepared for the coming changes in healthcare," said David Corkum, senior vice president of commercial markets, in a statement.

"As healthcare reform rolls out, it's more important than ever to provide benefits education to consumers," adds Clayton Nicholas, VP of strategy and marketing at Change Healthcare. "Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota is staying on the forefront in driving increased employee engagement as a way to control those costs."

Nathan Golia is senior editor of Insurance & Technology. He joined the publication in 2010 as associate editor and covers all aspects of the nexus between insurance and information technology, including mobility, distribution, core systems, customer interaction, and risk ... View Full Bio