FEATURE / HEALTHCARE
THE ACA EFFECT:
WORKING IN HEALTHCARE P&C The Affordable Care Act has already changed the healthcare landscape significantly, but opportunities for property/casualty agents abound. Allison Landa investigates For insurance agents, the Affordable Care Act is more than just a game-changer. It is a major shift in the industry landscape, and the resulting tremors are offering chances as well as challenges – particularly for those agents with a property/casualty focus. “The property-casualty insurance industry is likely to become the target of significant additional cost-shifting by hospitals, physicians, and other medical providers responding to the costcontainment provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA),” asserts the Insurance Research Council in an introduction to its report, “The Affordable Care Act and PropertyCasualty Insurance.” “As a purchaser of healthcare services and as a participant in healthcare markets, the property-
casualty industry finds itself in a changed environment, where the medical providers with whom they engage and the claimants they serve are themselves confronted by major changes related to the ACA. Increased cost-shifting could have potentially significant and long-lasting consequences for property-casualty insurance.” This begs the question, however, of how to grab those opportunities and sidestep the pitfalls. According to experts in the field, a little savvy and sophistication go a long way when it comes to staying on top of these changing times.
THE TRICKLE-DOWN EFFECT As a result of the Affordable Care Act, groups ranging from hospitals to integrated health systems and physician groups, as well as solo practitioner
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