Schweitzer awarded for transparency in health care costs

Due to its advocacy in keeping health care costs low, one Idaho employer received an award for its transparency.

Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, headquartered in Pullman, Washington, with a location Boise, was awarded the 2024 Dave Kelleher Leadership Award by the Employers’ Forum of Indiana (EFI) at the organization’s All-Stakeholder Meeting on Nov. 12 in Indianapolis.

EFI is an employer-led health care coalition made up of employers, physicians, hospitals, health plans, benefit consultants and others who work to improve the value of health care services through various efforts and solutions.

“We’ve been so impressed with all that SEL is doing to support market and police initiatives towards aligning payment with the value of services provided,” said Gloria Sachdev, president of EFI. “Their commitment to health care price transparency is truly commendable.”

SEL’s Pamela Colley, the senior public affairs manager, accepted the award its behalf with Chris Foutch, the company’s forensic and financial analyst.

“A guiding principle at SEL is empowering the people who are closest to the problem to help come up with a solution,” said Edmund O. Schweitzer III, the company’s founder and president. “Advocating for health care price transparency is the first step in enabling patients and employers to fully understand the problem and push toward a solution. This is a problem that won’t get solved behind closed doors.”

According to SEL, it has worked with EFI since 2019 “as part of its ongoing efforts to improve health care price transparency and improve the quality of care for its employees, their families and others across the U.S. SEL uses its claims data to review contracts with its plan administrator and other providers to avoid hidden fees, identify large price discrepancies, manage its prescription drug program and contract directly with providers.”

Along with the leadership award, EFI presented its health care innovation award this year to Mark Cuban for his work through the Mark Cuban Cost Plus Drug Company to give patients access to safe, affordable medication.