NADP Insights – Dec. 2019

December 2019

by Board Chair Ron Bolden, Cigna

Year in Review

This past year NADP excelled in every area as we continued to provide exemplary education, zealous representation on behalf of our members and invaluable resources. This December newsletter provides a year in review. As you read the various updates regarding NADP programs and core services in the balance of this newsletter, I want to highlight some of the most memorable moments from 2019.

Education: To increase your knowledge about timely market trends and challenges, NADP offered professional development focused on the dental benefits industry. CONVERGE, the annual conference, delivered invaluable opportunities to connect with colleagues plus educational content presented in three tracks: business development, government relations and provider relations. The Discovery Zone exhibit hall added to the experience by showcasing the products and services designed to help you succeed. To extend your professional development opportunities, NADP also produced the 2019 Webinar Series, providing affordable, timely educational content to your team throughout the year.

Advocacy: Your positions and issues took center stage through the NADP Advocacy Program, which represents your concerns to industry stakeholders and state and federal lawmakers. Highlights included

• Advocacy in Action (AIA) is our Congressional fly-in where we met with elected officials and their staff regarding the most critical issues facing our industry. AIA is our most powerful and effective advocacy initiative as we enhance the understanding of our issues and the relationships we’ve built with legislators and their staff. Since AIA began in 2016, attendance has more than doubled and our impact in Washington, D.C. has also increased exponentially.
• NADP continued it year-round representation through direct representation, engaging local lobbyists, and partnership with other organizations on federal and state issues such as:

• Health Insurance Tax moratorium
• Dental in Medicare
• McCarran-Ferguson Anti-Trust Repeal
• Non-Covered Services
• Network Leasing
• Dental Loss Ratios
• Prior Authorizations
• Reinsurance programs and related taxes
• The independent purchase of dental plans on Exchanges

• NADP produced advocacy Resources, including spreadsheets monitoring multiple issues by state or federal topic.

Terminology, Standards and Transaction Initiative (TST): NADP continued to represent your unique perspective of the dental benefits industry to multiple stakeholders involved in standard settings for electronic data interchange via the work of the TST sub-workgroups: Codes, Diagnostic Terminology and Dental Quality Alliance. TST also includes the Operations WorkGroup, which reviewed accreditation proposals and continued to act as a liaison to Dental Support Organizations and the EDI WorkGroup, which reviewed and commented on mandated EDI transactions for claims processing, electronic funds transfer and electronic health records. Highlights included:

• The Provider Directory Validation Process, a uniform spreadsheet and attestation to streamline updates of provider contact information.
• The CDT Licensing Program which distributed the new Codes early and provided savings of 20-25% on fees.
• Industry collaboration ensured efficient business processes. NADP represented our members to numerous stakeholders governing standards and transactions and held voting seats on:
• American Dental Association’s (ADA) Code Maintenance Committee (CMC),
• ADA Dental Content Committee (DeCC),
• ADA SNODENT Canvas Committee
• ADA Standards Committee on Dental Informatics (SCDI)
• Dental Quality Alliance
• Health Level 7 (HL7)
• SNOMED International Dentistry Clinical Reference Group (CRG)
• X12

Research: NADP produced both valuable industry reports plus behavioral studies focused on employers and consumers. Through the annual suite of NADP Statistical Reports, NADP offered invaluable information to help you maintain your competitive edge and provided a solid foundation for NADP’s Advocacy efforts. These industry reports are included in your membership and offer data on enrollment, network administration, financial operations, plan design and metrics on claims processing and contact centers. In addition, NADP published the Annual State of the Market Report and 51 State Reports.

Through the Shared Research Program, NADP members had the opportunity to sponsor primary research studies on employers and consumers every year. By pooling resources, sponsoring plans were able to gain key insights into the attitudes and behaviors of key target audiences for a fraction of the cost of conducting the research on their own

Additional Member Services: NADP also provided the following resources designed to help you with industry challenges and to make the most of your membership.

• WhyDental.org, developed by the NADP Communications WorkGroup, is a consumer website offering educational and promotional content about the value of dental benefits. The site provides targeted content to multiple audiences including brokers, employers, employees, providers and individual consumers. The WorkGroup has a multi-year action plan to provide new and updated content.
• Dental Interact keeps members informed on key issues and interests. The Advocacy Open Forum, the most vibrant community, generally posts new content regularly about issues impacting your company.
• Newsletters were identified as the most used NADP member benefit by the 2019 Member Survey. It’s no surprise since the NADP MonthlyByte provides the most recent updates on NADP programs and services while the weekly NADP SmartBriefs offers summaries to the top news stories in the dental benefits industry.
• Presentations and Charts, located in the Knowledge Center, provide slides and graphics ready to use in your own presentations. In 2019, NADP added presentations and charts on the following topics:

• Market Overview (presentation)
• Dental Integration and Coordinated Care (presentation)
• Dental Benefit Options for Seniors (presentation)
• Commercial Dental Benefits by Plan Type (chart)
• Dental Health Care Consumer Behavior (chart)

In addition to the above highlights, NADP honored former Executive Director Evelyn Ireland at CONVERGE 2019 in celebration of her retirement and recognition of her service. Following a rigorous search process, NADP announced the hire of Eme Augustini as the new NADP Executive Director, effective Nov. 1.

These are just some of the highlights of 2019. NADP will be building on this success in 2019, beginning with Leadership Conference, Jan. 13-15 in Dallas.

Should you have any questions about the direction of NADP, please contact me.