‘360 support with whatever they need,’
MetroPlus Health’s new leader outlines
plan to help combat breast cancer
Dr. Tayla Schwartz, president and CEO of MetroPlus Health Plan, is a pediatrician by training. Photo by Alejandra O’Connell-Domenech
Caribbean L BQ ife, Oct. 11-17, 2019 3
By Alejandra O’connell-Domenech When it comes to helping breast
cancer survivors, MetroPlus
Health Plan is dedicated to
ensuring that all of them
receive the full care they deserve.
“As an insurer we somewhat go against
the current,” said Dr. Tayla Schwartz,
president and CEO of MetroPlus Health
Plan, which covers over half a million New
Yorkers. “We want to focus on vulnerable
populations that need health care, the
populations that need support. We don’t
shy away from them, we proactively try
to bring them into MetroPlus . . . because
we know that we can provide them with
comprehensive support here, true hands
on what we call 360 support with whatever
they need.”
In order to ensure that members are
staying up to date with yearly exams,
MetroPlus Health constantly checks
member data to determine who are the
women who qualify for or need breast
cancer screenings. Once the company
determines that a member should see a
provider, they use all means of communication,
phone calls, texts, e-mails, letters
to get in touch. In order to best communicate
with a diverse membership, the
health plan tries to contact members in
the language that they speak and boasts a
multi-lingual staff along with easy access
to language lines.
If for some reason a member is unable
to get in touch with her physician, a
MetroPlus Health employee can call a
provider and schedule and appointment
for her. To encourage members to prioritize
their health, MetroPlus incentivizes
women to schedule a yearly mammogram
by offering reward points which
can be used to purchase items from the
company’s rewards catalogue. In order to
not just have the responsibility placed on
the member, MetroPlus also financially
incentivizes doctors to make sure that
their patients are up to date on their early
exams.
MetroPlus Health understands that
it is not always easy for members to
make to a doctor’s appointment and will
bring health care to the community by
holding public events where women can
be screened on the spot. In 2018, there
were 37, 403 mammograms performed
on MetroPlus Health members. The
health plan currently has 1,600 members
undergoing treatment for breast cancer,
a number that has stayed stable over the
last five years.
During member data analysis and out
in communities, MetroPlus Health takes
special care to encourage higher risk
demographics, especially African American
women, to undergo breast cancer
screenings. According to the Center for
Disease Control, black women are 40
percent more likely to die of breast cancer
than white women.
“It’s very clear that any time you want
to make a dent in a health issue, there
isn’t one approach that works,” said
Schwartz. “You have to attack it from
multiple angles.”
A Doctor’s Passion
MetroPlus Health Plan is not your
typical health insurance program and
that is in part because of the passion and
care of Dr. Tayla Schwartz, president
and CEO of MetroPlus Health Plan, a
pediatrician by training. Dr. Schwartz
has known that she wanted to be a physician
since “the time she could speak”
and brings her need to care for other
into every position she holds.
“We are tremendously lucky to be
who we are,” said Dr. Schwartz.
After serving in the military in her
native Israel, Dr. Schwartz studied at
the Sackler School of Medicine and
came to New York for a residency in
Pediatrics at Maimonides Medical Center
in Brooklyn. Schwartz worked as a
pediatrician at the Children’s National
Medical Center in Washington D.C.
and simultaneously conducted basic
research at the National Institute of
Health. Two years after her fellowship,
Schwartz began working for a healthcare
consulting firm where she was first
able to view healthcare “through a different
lens” and subsequently became
more interested in the business side of
healthcare. Schwartz has been president
and CEO of MetroPlus Health Plan
since 2006.