Hybrid Employee Healthcare Model Expands Access, Boosts Satisfaction

CHG Healthcare has come a long way since they opened their first employee healthcare center at their headquarters in Salt Lake City. Fast-forward 10 years, the healthcare staffing organization now runs dedicated employee health centers at their hubs in Boca Raton and Fort Lauderdale, Fla., as well as Durham, N.C.

CHG employees and their families utilize the health centers, operated by Marathon Health, for comprehensive primary care, behavioral health support, chronic condition management, and health coaching, while the majority of the organization’s remote employees also can access health coaching virtually.

When the COVID-19 pandemic ramped up in 2020 and forced CHG’s headquartered employees to work from home, the organization wanted to ensure employees could continue to access healthcare without coming to the office. The solution? Open a Marathon Health Network health center close to where employees live, says Anne Hopkins, Director of People & Operations at CHG.

Network Employee Health Center Brings Care Close to Home

As the first customer to join Marathon Health’s Salt Lake City Network, CHG had the opportunity to influence where they built their health center. To ensure it was in a convenient location — ideally within 10 miles of most employee homes — Anne says Marathon Health created a heat map showing all employee addresses and picked the “perfect spot,” located right off the highway.

(Photo above: Grand opening of Marathon Health’s Network Health Center in Salt Lake City.)

CHG also changed their health center hours to accommodate their employees’ virtual work schedules, switching from a traditional nine-to-five model to expanding hours and offering evening appointments. “Many of the schools in Utah are only open for a half-day on Fridays, so we offer longer hours on Fridays for employees to take their kids in and also have that longer availability for themselves as well,” Anne says.

Carrie Koncar, CHG’s Senior Wellness Specialist, People and Operations, says CHG employees love their Marathon Health providers, which is a key driver of their high health center engagement. Rather than hiring new staff for the Network health center, Carrie says they moved one of their beloved providers to the new location.

“We don’t have much turnover when it comes to our providers. They stay with us, and they know all of our employees and their families,” Carrie says. “So, we moved our clinical director, Randy Archibald, PA-C, from our headquarters location to our Network site, because our people love him so much and he has done a fantastic job. Now, people use the Network site because of him, not just because of the convenience. He really does have a following.”

Provider Relationships Drive Employee Health Improvements

That care team following, Carrie and Anne say, is a direct result of them embedding the providers in CHG’s culture. They make sure to include their providers in all company events, so employees can put a face to name, build relationships and ultimately feel confident trusting them with their healthcare.

“If we didn’t have the Marathon component, it wouldn’t be CHG,” Carrie says. “I think a lot of people, especially the tenured employees, don’t even think of Marathon Health as a separate entity. It’s a part of who we are and what we do.”

Anne agrees. “Marathon is part of our culture. It’s just become ingrained in our culture. There’s a lot of stories on ROI (CHG has achieved $5.2 million in net savings), but where Marathon has truly made a difference is in the relationships they’ve built with our people. They’re a trusted partner.”

Now a decade into the partnership, CHG sees higher-than-industry-average engagement across all health centers, including 50% engagement for high-risk employees, while 75% of employees have made improvements on key biometrics, such as blood pressure, cholesterol and A1c. Recent surveys found 99% of employees report being “satisfied” or “very satisfied” with their Marathon Health services.

In 2017, CHG began offering behavioral health support, a service Hopkins says is highly popular and effective. “They’re constantly booked with employees,” Anne says. Over the past 24 months, the number of CHG employees with no signs of depression increased by 32% after at least two behavioral health visits, while the number of employees with no symptoms of anxiety increased by 84%. In September 2022, they became the first Marathon Health client to roll out pediatric behavioral health services.

“We just love our providers. They take the time to talk to you, to get to know you and your family,” Anne says. “They really dive in and ask those questions that regular doctors don’t take the time to ask. It’s about relationship-building and our people crave that. I think that’s the Marathon difference.”