Description: Align carrier, agent, and consumer definition(s) of DTC to establish a collective understanding for the affected parties. Understand why a direct-to-consumer approach may be important for carriers’ and distributors’ growth and development goals, tactics and strategies. Use the agreed-upon baseline and understanding of DTC’s importance to establish and agree upon reasonable expectations for its role in marketing, distribution, and product development and performance. Position carriers and distributors together to align sales, marketing and performance expectations and incentives for all parties to increase the possibility of outperforming in (and outside of) the DTC space; design sales, marketing and distribution systems and approaches to meet consumers where they are at; and expand current sales and cultivate new markets to remain relevant and magnify profiles in an ever-changing industry.

Description: Report on meetings sessions in each of 5 tracks for Long Term Care professionals: Actuarial, Compliance, Operations, Policy and Provers, and Group.

Description: Article on the history of the Long Term Care Discussion Group, a Washington DC-based venue for discussing long-term care and related issues for over 20 years.

Description: Highlights from the 8th Intercompany Long-Term Care Insurance Conference held in March 2008, consisting of 56 sessions covering a range of long-term care insurance LTCI topics each with a track-specific focus.

Description: Report on the SOA's 1st Annual LTC Operations and Technology Benchmark Survey. Its goals were to provide data to support the development of time and cost benchmarks for LTC operations, identify the most pressing operations and technology issues, and gain insights into the technologies that are being used to administer Long Term Care business.

Description: Panel session on the challenge that many insurers face as they try to grow their long-term-care insurance business, while simultaneously ensuring analysts and shareholders that earnings targets will be met.

Description: Report on the proceedings of the 2010 Long Term Care Think Tank Session, whose goals were to discuss the major issues and challenges facing the LTC insurance industry, and to formulate action items and initiatives to help the industry move ahead. Focus was on understanding the needs & affordability capabilities of different market segments, the limited variety of product designs, shrinking distribution force, regulation and public policy, implications of the CLASS Act, and ideas for educating consumers and marketing products.

Description: This essay highlights that the healthcare of the future should offer unversal coverage, preserve competitiveness, research cost and quality and offer free or low cost preventative services.

Description: Call for papers for publication in Actuarial Research Clearing House (ARCH). The primary goal of ARCH is the speedy dissemination of current thinking and aids to research rather than the publication of thoroughly edited papers. ARCH welcomes short notes or papers, correspondence between researchers, useful computer programs (or announcements of the availability of such programs), translations of appropriate material in foreign languages, problems, solutions, etc.

Description: This is the first in a series of articles about accounting for reinsurance under GAAP Targeted Improvements to the Accounting for Long-Duration Contracts (LDTI). It provides an introduction to the topic, giving an overview of what has and hasn't changed. Changes include a few that directly address reinsurance and others that indirectly result from changes to direct accounting and the existing ties between reinsurance and direct accounting.