A county benefits adviser reviewed Stephenson County’s property-casualty and workers'-compensation renewals and presented a proposed health-plan renewal that would raise fully insured medical premiums roughly 15.8 percent; the finance committee heard the presentation on Oct. 10 but did not vote on premium or coverage changes at that meeting.

The presenter advised keeping liability coverage for the county nursing center while ownership and operations work through a management company sale; he said excluding the nursing center from excess liability now could expose the county to lawsuits while the county still owns assets. The presenter recommended the committee “go with the green column and keep liability coverages for the nursing home” until the facility and assets are fully divested.

On benefits, the presenter described a 15.8 percent renewal for the county’s Blue Cross Blue Shield fully insured medical plan and said the plan remains in a loss position because high-cost claimants and specialty drugs drive costs. He proposed several cost-management options and recommended implementing RxMapper, a voluntary pharmacogenomics program that sequences a cheek-swab DNA sample for selected high-cost members, then offers telehealth pharmacy counseling and suggested medication adjustments to treating physicians.

The presenter gave the committee an estimated implementation cost and return scenarios: helping three high-cost members in a 170-employee population would cost roughly $7,000 and was projected to yield $63,000 in annual savings in the adviser’s model (a 9x ROI); larger participation scenarios produced larger projected ROIs. He emphasized participation would be voluntary, HIPAA-compliant and that RxMapper would not share DNA data with the employer.

Committee members asked how many employees would use the service, the timeline (the presenter said it could start Jan. 1 to coincide with benefit renewals), and whether Blue Cross Blue Shield or other carriers have incentives to pursue preventive drug-cost measures. The presenter said most carriers have limited motivation to reduce short-term drug costs because their premiums already include those payments.

Neither liability coverage changes nor the health-plan renewal were on the committee’s action list for that meeting. The adviser said he would bring formal recommendations to the county board and recommended the finance committee seek consensus before the board meeting; the committee discussed but took no binding vote on either the insurance renewals or RxMapper at the Oct. 10 session.