Lab Soft News: Walmart Shapes Its Own Primary Care, Unbundling Strategy

Walmart is establishing its own version of a primary care, unbundling healthcare strategy (Walmart Care Clinics) that is both similar and different to CVS-Aetna. The details were discussed in a recent article (see: Walmart Health: A Deep Dive into the $WMT Corporate Strategy in Health Care)

...[R]eports [have emerged] that Walmart is in merger talks with Humana, a health insurer with a $37B market cap [to] make Walmart look more like an integrated health care delivery system with every passing day. On top of Walmart’s existing health care offerings, these two acquisitions would functionally give Walmart the following:

Risk-aligned health insurance plans that incentivize the expansion of low-cost retail primary care clinics in underserved geographies.
A distribution footprint that places outpatient primary care clinics within 15 minutes of 90% of the US population.
A seamless online pharmacy with home medication delivery funneling into a robust e-commerce offering.

Here are two reasons why outpatient primary care is ready to be unbundled from traditional health care delivery systems, i.e. hospitals, for two reasons: (see: Walmart Health: A Deep Dive into the $WMT Corporate Strategy in Health Care):

Most patients that visit primary care physicians don’t need the resources of an expensive medical center on-hand for each visit, and would be better served by an experience that emphasized price, convenience, and attention.
Reimbursement rates for most primary care services, e.g. a blood pressure checkup or physical exam, are much lower than specialty care (imaging, biopsies, intensive procedures, etc) and thus provide a lower short-term return on invested capital.

Like CVS-Aetna, Walmart is seeking to integrate its healthcare business with a health insurance company, currently Humana. Walmart also has a web-based prescription drug program. By way of contrast to its CVS-Aetna competitor, Walmart is emphasizing the following aspects of its primary care program:

A low-cost, rural-aligned retail program in underserved areas,
Some emphasis on chronic care and medical referrals, at least in its web marketing materials (see: Walmart Care Clinics).
High profile prescription program offering some drugs with a $4 prescription price tag.

May 2020