Brookfield, Wisconsin—With an eye on both their employees’ health and their bottom line, multiemployer and public employer plans are rapidly embracing a new trend—value-based health care (VBHC). This outcome-driven, consumer-centered approach focuses not on the dollars being spent, but on how the dollars being spent can improve employees’ health. It also stresses the importance of keeping healthy employees healthy.

A new survey released by the International Foundation of Employee Benefit Plans finds that in the last year, the number of multiemployer and public employer plans that consider their health and wellness offerings to be a part of a broader VBHC strategy more than doubled from 16% to 37%.

“As employers strive to reduce their health care costs there has been an increasing interest in value-based health care,” reported Sally Natchek, Senior Research Director at the International Foundation. “The majority of organizations we surveyed are just beginning to take steps to provide...