Description: Three appendices: Selected Readings, Summary of Data Preparation and Data Issues, and Detailed Results on Predictive Accuracy. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.

Description: Transcript of General Session 1:Implications of Longer Life Spans: What Does This All Mean to Us?

Description: This SOA-funded study examines the relative performance of different risk assessment methods and risk adjustment systems. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.

Description: Chapter 7 reviews several items that the study identified as requirements for a good risk assessment method. They are: accurate predictability, practicality and reasonable cost, limitation on ability to game the system, timeliness in regard to premiums, appropriate incentives for efficiency. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.

Description: Introduction sets out the objectives of comparing the predictive accuracy of different risk assessment methods, comparing the different methods based on other criteria, and then examining issues related to high-cost individuals and conditions. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.

Description: Chapter 8 suggests possible areas for further research such as other data groupings, high risk pooling, how diagnosis-based risk assessment might be improved, study of an expanded list of high-cost diagnoses, and comparisons to diagnoses from earlier time periods. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.

Description: This paper describes a concept product, advanced-life delayed annuity ALDA, which would be acquired at a young age small premiums would be paid over a ling period of time but the ALDA would only begin paying an inflation-adjusted life-contingent income at the advanced age of 80, 85, or even 90.

Description: Abstract: The percentage of the population who are obese has grown dramatically worldwide over the last several decades, although stabilizing recently in the United States. Studies have found the effects on mortality to be inconsistent and controversial because of methodological differences and the complexity of the relationship between obesity and mortality. This paper discusses this relationship and sheds light on the likely effects of this epidemic. Issues associated with the so-called obesity-mortality paradox, where mortality experience is lower for those individuals who are overweight and in some who are obese compared with the mortality of those in the normal weight category, are examined. Although certain recently reported studies of the relationship between mortality and obesity indicate that obesity is related to a reduced percent of additional mortality, this may in part be due to the shorter average time that those currently obese have been exposed to their condition. Nevertheless, the amount of health care costs and rates of disability associated with being obese are significant, contributing to the increase in overall health care costs as they become more numerous and age. Although obesity is being addressed with a great deal of activity and publicity, they will continue to prove challenging for individuals and society to manage and overcome.

Description: Any analysis of risk assessment and risk adjustment must pay special attention to large claims. If the goal of risk adjustment is to motivate carriers to be efficient,, as opposed to motivating carriers to select the best risks,then finding a solution to the problem of compensating carriers fairly for these high-cost claimants is an absolute necessity. From A Comparative Analysis of Methods of Health Risk Assessment, M-HB96-1.ese

Description: The percentage of the population who are obese has grown dramatically worldwide over the last several decades, although stabilizing recently in the United States. Studies have found the effects on mortality to be inconsistent and controversial because of methodological differences and the complexity of the relationship between obesity and mortality. This paper discusses this relationship and sheds light on the likely effects of this epidemic. Issues associated with the so-called obesity-mortality paradox, where mortality experience is lower for those individuals who are overweight and in some who are obese compared with the mortality of those in the normal weight category, are examined. Although certain recently reported studies of the relationship between mortality and obesity indicate that obesity is related to a reduced percent of additional mortality, this may in part be due to the shorter average time that those currently obese have been exposed to their condition. Nevertheless, the amount of health care costs and rates of disability associated with being obese are significant, contributing to the increase in overall health care costs as they become more numerous and age. Although obesity is being addressed with a great deal of activity and publicity, they will continue to prove challenging for individuals and society to manage and overcome.