Worsening health risks, including cancer, musculoskeletal and mental health conditions have highlighted the need for more effective preventative healthcare measures. Among these issues, we’ve seen mental health incidence rates increase by 21%, with severity rising by 13.2%.
An increasingly burdened NHS has caused many employees to turn to private medical insurance (PMI). This comes as the UK’s gross medical inflation hit 15% in 2024. This low number of claimants has created volatility in pricing among insurers, with PMI costs rising 32% on average last year. Traditionally, employers have attempted to use reinsurance to limit this volatility, but with premiums rising rapidly, organisations are looking for more certainty through proactive risk management strategies.
A better view of workforce health
Against the backdrop of rising private medical costs, Aon’s Health Risk Analyser empowers organisations to identify high-risk cohorts within their employee population, enabling data-driven and real-time strategies to maximise value from their healthcare spend. Taking carrier claims data across demographics, claims types, frequency and cost, these high-risk cohorts can be targeted with more accurate interventions to reduce cost volatility and bring about better health outcomes. Key benefits include:
- Predictive modelling – Historical claims data is used by our data scientists to predict high-cost claim risk by stratifying members into risk segments based on their claims history and demographics using machine learning.
- Risk optimisation – Understanding future risk enables smart budgeting, allowing employers to better prepare for predicted claim volatility as well as make the best decisions on how to manage and budget for the at-risk population.
- Ongoing monitoring – When integrated with a direct data feed, Health Risk Analyser can provide ongoing monitoring and predictive modelling updates to continually identify at-risk members and provide updated cost impacts.
- Personalised Interventions – leveraging the data from HRA personalised interventions can be communicated to at risk cohorts to reduce future risk.
Understand the priorities of your workforce
In August 2024, we surveyed 9,202 people in employment at organisations with more than 500 employees to share their thoughts on what workplace initiatives are valuable to them. From these responses we developed our 2025 Employee Sentiment Study, equipping senior business, human resources, and people leaders with the strategies required to deliver impactful total rewards, culture and leadership that will help realise the potential of their people.
The study has helped inform our advice to clients, noting trends and interventions that can be applied across the workforce. We found a clear correlation between flexible working patterns and employee wellbeing, with hybrid workers more likely to describe their wellbeing as thriving or good. The importance of adaptable benefits was also emphasised, while sixty percent of employees surveyed are either in the process of moving employers or will seek new employment in the next 12 months.
How Aon can help
At Aon, we’re committed to making sure our clients are better informed, better advised and make better decisions through our delivery of actionable analytic insight from solutions like Health Risk Analyser, globally integrated expertise and locally relevant solutions.
In a competitive talent landscape, this means helping organisations develop a greater understanding of how employees view their benefits. The Benefits Solution (TBS), our specialised, award-winning platform, ensures a personalised user experience to connect people with EVPs, benefits, wellbeing and total rewards. This enables employers a valuable insight into their workforce and helps predict and manage future costs whilst achieving business impact.
TBS enables our employee benefits benchmarking capabilities, providing leaders with the data and analytics needed to view the competitiveness of their health and benefits offering across multiple fronts. This includes plan design, plan costs and even how employee health outcomes compare to peers in their industry, region or market segment.
About the author
David Kirk leads Aon’s UK health strategic sales function and is the global growth, marketing and communications functional leader for Aon’s total reward business.
With 13 years’ experience across EMEA and North America scaling go-to-market Saas businesses, David’s in-depth knowledge and technology expertise helps advise businesses and founders on where to focus for maximum impact.
At Aon, David helps organisations enhance growth and efficiency through their evolving workforce landscape through the health of their people leveraging data and technology.
As a result of David’s passion for improving employee health to enable better business outcomes he has also invested in several early-stage technology businesses.
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