Three trends in the healthcare liability marketplace

Network security and privacy issues are especially prevalent in the healthcare sector. Yet surprisingly, there is still a lot of space to sell the coverage to business classes throughout the sector.

Life & Health

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Network security and privacy issues are especially prevalent in the healthcare sector. Yet surprisingly, there is still a lot of space to sell the coverage to business classes throughout the sector.

The sophisticated buyers obviously have a separate policy someplace, but you would be surprised how many companies don’t have any coverage,” said Jordan Connelly, Senior Vice President of Healthcare and Atlanta Branch Manager of Worldwide Facilities, LLC.

“You look at some of the patient records that our clients hold – sometimes they have hundreds of thousands or even millions of records – and yet they still don’t carry any network security or privacy coverage. It’s just not on their radar.”

Connelly likens the situation to that of employee practices liability insurance 15 or so years ago, before some spectacular losses made EPLI a mandatory coverage.

“We are getting to that point with network security and privacy, that this is not optional anymore,” Connelly said. “It’s been educational for many insureds, to overcome the ‘This can’t happen to me’ mentality.”

Integration of technology is another huge driver in the healthcare sector today. This could be anything from a nurse practitioner diagnosing a patient’s condition over the phone and sending the prescription to a pharmacy a block away, to virtual consultations with top physicians across the country.

Brad Rosgen, healthcare practice leader for Burns & Wilcox, has also observed a transformation in the traditional family medical practice model. These days, he said, clinics and urgent care centers are more likely to be staffed by nurse practitioners and physician’s assistants than actual physicians.

Meanwhile, scores of doctors are returning to that most old-fashioned of practices – making house calls. “It’s a different model that provides for a potentially larger revenue stream, because they can charge a bit more for house calls than an office visit, with less overhead,” Rosgen said.

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