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Purdue working on changes to next year's health plans

Purdue is taking a three-prong approach to controlling health care costs.

Vice President for Human Resources Luis Lewin says the first part is opening an on-site health and wellness clinic for employees in February. He says the goal is to have an integrated health approach.

"We want the clinic to handle primary care and urgent care. We also want to provide other approaches to health, such as a dietician, nutritionist, health coaches, the help people with lifestyle changes and help employees navigate the community medical services, organizations and providers."

He says they also want to work with an employee’s primary care doctor to improve wellness. The Center for Healthy Living is scheduled to open in early February with a vendor running the facility.

Lewin says another step to bringing down spending is restructuring the three medical plans offered to employees.

"In 2014, we looking at maybe merging the the Co-pay and Incentive [PPO] plan, but we have to really do an analysis, looking at the pros and cons. They have to be balanced. They have to be affordable for employees and also for Purdue.”

Lewin says the Co-pay plan is twice as expensive as the PPO plan and eight times more expensive than the health savings account plan.

He says the third part of bringing down health care spending is a database employees can use to compare the cost of routine tests and procedures.

Health care costs for Purdue are expected to increase 6-10% next year. That means as much as $15.5 million. Purdue also plans to pay 80% of employees’ premiums, instead of the current 85% it now covers.