Thailand's healthcare system is facing significant challenges: an ageing society, rise in non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and continuously increasing costs of medical treatment and technology.
This has resulted in the country’s medical inflation rate outstripping the general inflation rate, and putting pressure on all sectors, including the government, hospitals and insurance.
In a special lecture, titled ‘Behind the Insurance Premiums: A Deep Dive into the Structure and Dynamics of the Private Health Insurance Business in Thailand’ at the 2nd Thailand Healthcare Policy Forum, Thai Life Insurance Association (TLIA) President Nusra Banyatpiyapoj said private insurance plays a crucial role in complementing the public segment’s health benefits, alongside the government’s national health insurance system.
Keeping the system sustainable
According to Ms Nusra when she spoke about the sustainability of the health insurance system, the industry has begun implementing co-payment measures for new standard health insurance policies, in accordance with the guidelines of the Office of Insurance Commission (OIC).
The life insurance segment is also accelerating the adoption of digital technologies and AI in underwriting processes, analysing health data, detection of anomalies in claims and connecting data with wearable health devices and telemedicine services, in order to enhance the quality of preventive healthcare.
Ms Nusra noted that the TLIA is continuing its collaboration with the Ministry of Public Health, as well. The collaboration is aimed at developing the public healthcare system to support voluntary insurance policyholders, as well.
Moreover, she highlighted that the association is supporting the development of standardised medical expense data and the e-claim system to improve the efficiency of data linkage between hospitals and insurance companies.
Lastly, she emphasised the importance of creating a national health insurance bureau to connect data from the government, private and insurance sectors.
According to Ms Nusra, this would help improve health budget management, forecast disease burden and reduce fraud, waste and abuse in the Thai health system.