Description: More and more providers are desiring risk-based contracts instead of traditional FFS-based contracts. This session is intended to outline some of the actuarial best practices in risk-based contracting related to the many flavors of the CMS ACO programs, as well as Commercial risk-based contracts.

Description: A summary recap of the recent SOA Health Conference held in Dallas, TX in June of 2025. With the intentional use of AI to assist with the summary, this article gives a good overview of the recent conference with personal commentary from one of the attendees.

Description: During the past few years, performance, cost, and risk trends for Medigap products have undergone substantial changes. Some of these trends could ease cost pressures on Medigap insurers, while others might increase them. Part 1 of this Issue Brief article discusses current changing trends and considerations around about how they are impacting Medigap.

Description: This chapter focuses on creating practical models that aid in the prediction of the risk of readmission to a specific hospital within 30 days of discharge for Medicare patients, to aid in the identification and stratification of at-risk patients for hospitals considering building an intervention program in a cost-effective manner. For readers who wish to develop their own predictive model, a dataset is provided on the Actexmadriver.com website, and R code is provided in the appendix to this chapter.

Description: The big event of 2023 is the launch of multiple Humira biosimilars, which began in January with the arrival of Amgen’s Amjevita on the market. The launch of Amjevita kicks off the process of changing the specialty drug marketplace in the United States. The expectation of the full impact of this big event is very hopeful, but there is still uncertainty several months after its beginning. Humira is the highest-selling drug in the world and has been since 2013 (Figure 1)—except for when COVID-19 projects temporarily surpassed it. The world is eagerly awaiting the launch of multiple biosimilar drugs to compete with Humira and hopefully bring more competitive pricing to the benefit of payers and patients everywhere.

Description: Essay reforming healthcare where participants have a vested interest in reaching the best answer.

Description: Overview of plans designed to cover out-of-pocket medical costs as a supplement to major medical coverage.

Description: Savings from biosimilars have accelerated significantly in the past few years. There has been a number of relatively recent biosimilar launches that can help to shape our expectations of the financial impact that could result from this year’s big event. Savings from biosimilars have accelerated significantly in the past few years. There has been a number of relatively recent biosimilar launches that can help to shape our expectations of the financial impact that could result from this year’s big event.

Description: This is a discussion of the medical loss ratio, the confusion and debate over the calculation method under the new MLR requirement, and the opportunities it presents to consulting actuaries.

Description: "The ACA RADV Program will begin to impact issuers’ risk transfers in the 2018 benefit year (BY) – potentially significantly. The program is expected to continue into the 2019 BY and beyond. Therefore, health actuaries working in the ACA market need to understand this program and its potential impact.The session includes panel experts who will provide attendees with high-level overview of the program, discuss the findings from a national study, and RADV’s ultimate impact to risk transfers, as well as downstream impacts to financial and pricing decisions. The nationwide study is based on 300+ issuers’ 2016 RADV results and contains emerging insights into the new ACA RADV program otherwise unavailable. The panel’s agenda will include:1. A succinct overview of the ACA RADV Program will be provided2. Summary of a national 2016 ACA RADV pilot study results and its findings. 3. Preliminary results from a national 2017 RADV study will be discussed (or CMS published results if available prior to session). 4. Walkthrough of how RADV results impact the overall risk adjustment transfers in the ACA market. 5. Finally, the panel will discuss RADV impact to issuer’s financial accruals and pricing strategy. 6. General Q&A, discussion"