Thought Leaders in Healthcare IT: HealthSherpa CTO Ning Liang (Part 1)

Much of Obamacare goes untapped due to lack of information and awareness. HealthSherpa is helping consumers access the facility.

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start by introducing our audience to yourself as well as to HealthSherpa. 

Ning Liang: I’m one of the co-founders at HealthSherpa. We make it simple and easy to enroll in health and dental insurance utilizing subsidies available under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which is also commonly known as Obamacare.

To date, we’ve enrolled over three million people in subsidized health and dental insurance in the process. It helped them save $21 billion in premium.

Sramana Mitra: So, could you please double click down into the segment that you are helping out these three million people that you have helped enrolled into the ACA? What segment do you go after and how do you go after that segment?

Ning Liang: First and foremost, one of core things about the ACA or Obamacare involves helping consumers afford a health coverage. It does that in two ways. One is through direct subsidies that you can use to pay for your premium – to your health plan – and that is based on your income. It also essentially expands State programs that provide health coverage as well.

We basically specialize in helping people, typically from a lower end of the income scale, navigate the government program to maximize the savings that they can get for their health plans and to manage that process so that we can continue to maintain the savings over time to be able to afford the health insurance.

Our average consumer’s household income is around $21,000 per year and once they utilize our system, they typically only pay about $30 to $40 on average out of pocket. About a third of our consumers pay zero dollars out of pocket. For health insurance, that typically costs $600 to $800 a month. 

Sramana Mitra: How do you get to them? How do you go to market? 

Ning Liang: We do it in a few ways. One is by being directly on the internet and creating content for our audience. Obviously, there is content around in how you actually utilize these government programs. How do you apply? How do you maintain your coverage? Once you enroll in your coverage, how do you make the most use of it? A lot of people in this population aren’t insured before. ACA is about getting them insured.

For many, it’s their first time that they have health insurance. They need to navigate through a lot of the basics. What is monthly premium? What is cost deductible? How do I find a doctor? Where do I find the cheapest price for this drug? 

This segment is part 1 in the series : Thought Leaders in Healthcare IT: HealthSherpa CTO Ning Liang
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