GiftCard Partners Blog

For self-insured employers and the third-party administrators (TPAs) who support them, rising healthcare costs are driven in large part by preventable utilization and avoidable claims. Much of today’s cost trend is tied to chronic conditions and care gaps that could be addressed earlier through preventive care, medication adherence, and routine screenings.

Preventive care and chronic condition monitoring are essential pillars of high-quality health care, particularly within modern Value-Based Care (VBC) and population health management models. Yet many care gaps persist. Even as plans rebound from pandemic-era disruptions, real-world evidence from the CDC shows incomplete preventive care remains a systemic challenge with measurable implications for HEDIS^® measure performance, Star Ratings improvement, and total cost of care reduction.

Healthcare and research organizations are entering 2026 with a clear mandate: engagement isn’t enough. Performance is measured by verified action, documented outcomes, and compliance-ready reporting.

Health plans and care organizations face growing pressure to improve CAHPS scores, yet many still rely on engagement tactics that stop short of driving real behavior change. Mailers, reminders, and education all have a role, but they rarely solve the core problem: members must actually complete care and feel supported doing it. Organizations that treat incentives as a quality improvement tool, not a giveaway, are seeing measurable gains in satisfaction, access, and follow-through.

Heart disease remains the leading cause of death in the United States and creates an enormous burden for people, communities, and healthcare providers. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), an American dies every 33 seconds from cardiovascular disease. And between 2019 and 2020, heart disease cost the U.S. about $252.2 billion in health care services, medicines, and lost productivity.