Dr. Alex Ding, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Humana

Summary

Becker’s Healthcare Podcast Summary Episode: Dr. Alex Ding, Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Humana Release Date: June 22, 2025

---

Introduction

In this episode of the Becker’s Healthcare Podcast, hosted by Becker's Healthcare, Dr. Alex Ding, Deputy Chief Medical Officer at Humana, shares invaluable insights into Humana’s strategies for enhancing healthcare delivery, ensuring quality care, promoting health equity, and leveraging value-based care models. Recorded live at the third annual Spring Payer Issues Roundtable, the discussion delves deep into the evolving landscape of healthcare from a payer and provider’s dual perspective.

---

Dr. Alex Ding’s Role at Humana

Dr. Ding begins by outlining his multifaceted role within Humana, highlighting his background as a board-certified diagnostic and interventional radiologist. He emphasizes his responsibilities in supporting the national clinician workforce and spearheading strategies to bolster physician and clinician engagement.

“My work really sits at the intersection of clinician enablement and empowerment, value-based care, whole person holistic care, and how we leverage innovative relationships and partnerships to improve health access and health outcomes, particularly for older adults.” ([00:48])

Dr. Ding explains Humana’s unique position as both a payer and a provider through its subsidiary, CenterWell, which encompasses primary care, home health, and pharmacy services. This duality allows Humana to adopt a patient-centered approach, focusing on integrated, team-based care for seniors and individuals with chronic conditions.

---

Best Practices in Regulatory Compliance and Quality of Care

Addressing the complexities of operating within the highly regulated health insurance sector, Dr. Ding outlines Humana’s proactive strategies to maintain and enhance the quality of care.

“We've built internal teams that track policy and regulatory shifts and are very nimble in that work.” ([02:12])

He emphasizes the importance of embedding quality into the care model beyond mere compliance, viewing it as a fundamental care standard and a key differentiator for the organization. Humana ensures that quality metrics are integral at all organizational levels, from business units to senior leadership and the board.

Moreover, Humana supports providers with real-time, actionable data through platforms like Compass Insights and has integrated payer data directly into providers’ electronic health records (EHRs) via the EPIC Payer platform. This integration empowers providers to meet quality measures seamlessly within their daily workflows.

---

Health Equity Initiatives

Dr. Ding passionately discusses Humana’s commitment to health equity, advocating for its integration across all facets of care delivery and benefit design.

“Equity has to be integrated. I think it's wrong to look at it as an initiative that's sitting off to the side or sitting over in corporate.” ([03:48])

A key initiative involves embedding social determinants of health into value-based care models. Humana’s providers are supported in screening for issues such as food insecurity, housing instability, and transportation needs, with reimbursements for addressing these challenges. Coordinated care teams proactively identify patient needs and connect them with community-based resources through partnerships with local and national organizations.

Additionally, Humana integrates equity into benefit designs by expanding access to transportation services, over-the-counter medications, and nutrition support, recognizing these as essential healthcare interventions rather than mere benefits.

---

Member Satisfaction and Engagement Strategies

Ensuring member satisfaction is critical in today’s competitive healthcare environment. Dr. Ding outlines Humana’s comprehensive engagement strategies aimed at building trust and enhancing member experiences.

“Trust and engagement really come from a number of things. Personalization, convenience, and whole person care.” ([05:14])

Humana employs predictive analytics and segmentation to tailor outreach and care coordination, acknowledging that healthcare is not a one-size-fits-all service. High-tech solutions like the WSDO platform for social connectedness complement high-touch approaches, including in-person events and live center wall clinics that foster community and trust.

Key performance indicators (KPIs) for measuring success include traditional metrics such as cap scores and Net Promoter Scores, alongside longitudinal engagement metrics. These include tracking preventive visit attendance, effective condition management, and the ability to delay or halt the progression of chronic diseases.

---

Future Opportunities for Payers in Healthcare Transformation

Looking ahead, Dr. Ding identifies significant opportunities for payers to drive transformative changes in healthcare delivery and outcomes.

“Payers can be that connective tissue that brings together data, incentives, and partnerships to drive value-based care transformation at scale.” ([06:39])

He advocates for a robust embrace of value-based care, extending beyond contractual agreements to encompass operations, enablement, and aligned incentives. By supporting providers with the necessary tools and workflows, payers can facilitate shared accountability and improved patient outcomes.

Dr. Ding shares evidence of successful value-based partnerships, highlighting benefits such as smaller patient panels for providers, increased time spent with patients, higher engagement, improved patient satisfaction, better health outcomes, and enhanced economic performance. Humana’s annual value-based care reports and issue briefs on emerging trends reinforce these achievements.

He emphasizes the importance of sustainability in healthcare, addressing affordability challenges for individuals and the nation. Leaders are encouraged to simplify data sharing, align incentives, and co-invest in essential tools to transition genuinely from volume to value-based care.

---

Conclusion

Dr. Alex Ding’s insights provide a comprehensive view of Humana’s approach to navigating the complexities of the healthcare landscape. By prioritizing quality care, integrating health equity, enhancing member engagement, and championing value-based care, Humana exemplifies a forward-thinking healthcare organization committed to delivering better outcomes for all stakeholders.

---

Notable Quotes:

• “My work really sits at the intersection of clinician enablement and empowerment, value-based care, whole person holistic care, and how we leverage innovative relationships and partnerships to improve health access and health outcomes, particularly for older adults.” — Dr. Alex Ding ([00:48])

• “We've built internal teams that track policy and regulatory shifts and are very nimble in that work.” — Dr. Alex Ding ([02:12])

• “Equity has to be integrated. I think it's wrong to look at it as an initiative that's sitting off to the side or sitting over in corporate.” — Dr. Alex Ding ([03:48])

• “Trust and engagement really come from a number of things. Personalization, convenience, and whole person care.” — Dr. Alex Ding ([05:14])

• “Payers can be that connective tissue that brings together data, incentives, and partnerships to drive value-based care transformation at scale.” — Dr. Alex Ding ([06:39])

---

This summary encapsulates the key discussions and insights shared by Dr. Alex Ding in the podcast episode, providing a comprehensive overview for those who have not listened to the full conversation.

Transcript

[A]

Evernorth brings the power of wonder and relentless innovation to create world class pharmacy care and benefits solutions. Barriers to care can lead to gaps in care which can drive up the total cost of care. Our capabilities work seamlessly together to create innovative pharmacy care and benefit solutions for today and tomorrow. Our connected health services make the treatment, prediction and prevention of health care's most complex conditions easier and more accessible as we drive organizations and people forward.

[B]

Hello and welcome to the Becker's Payers Issues podcast, recorded live here at the third annual Spring Payer Issues Roundtable. I'm joined today by Alex Ding, Deputy Chief Medical Officer at Humana. Alex, thank you so much for joining us today.

[C]

Thanks so much. Great to be with you.

[B]

It's my pleasure. Can you begin by telling us a little bit about yourself and your role at your organization?

[C]

Yeah, absolutely. So I am a practicing board certified diagnostic and interventional radiologist and, and I have the privilege of serving as Humana's Deputy Chief Medical Officer. So in this role I support our national clinician workforce and lead our strategy to strengthen physician and clinician engagement, especially how we build meaningful relationships with provider organizations and the physician community. So my work really sits at the intersection of clinician enablement and empowerment, value based care, whole person holistic care, and how we leverage innovative relationships and partnerships to improve health access in health outcomes, particularly for older adults. So for those of you who may be less familiar with Humana, we are a leading health and health care company. We serve millions of individuals across Medicare Advantage, Tricare and Medicaid as a payer organization. But we're also a provider organization through CenterWell, which is our wholly owned clinical subsidiary that includes primary care, home health and pharmacy services that are really all focused on delivering integrated team based care with a deep focus on seniors and people living with chronic conditions. So on the one hand, we're a payer, but we're also a care provider. And I think that dual perspective allows us to take a very patient centered approach to care.

[B]

Right. Well, in an ever evolving regulatory landscape, what best practices or tools does your organization rely on to keep quality of care at the forefront?

[C]

Yeah, well, you know, Humana operates in one of the most highly regulated spaces, that is health insurance, in particular Medicare Advantage, but also in care and clinical delivery. And so we've learned that you've really got to be proactive in this space. And so, you know, we've built internal teams that track policy and regulatory shifts and are very nimble in that work. But really, more importantly, we are trying to get back to Basics trying to get back to principles which is how do you bake quality into the model? Not just as a checkbox, as a compliance goal, but really as a care standard. We see it as an opportunity for us to differentiate, differentiate ourselves in that respect. And so we have made the quality of care a critical okr and metric that's got visibility across the organization from operating business units to senior leadership, all the way up to the board. And our decisions are really rooted in the belief that every individual deserves quality care. And so on the on the payer side we also try and help support providers with real time actionable data through platforms like Compass Insights. And we've co developed an integration into an electronic health record, the EPIC Payer platform, to integrate payer data and insights directly in line with provider EHRs so that they're empowered to meet those quality measures as part of their day to day work as well.

[B]

Addressing health equity has become a critical focus for many health plans. Can you share an overview of a key initiative here that you're involved in or particularly excited about and what are you hoping to achieve?

[C]

Yeah, I think equity has to be integrated. I think it's wrong to look at it as an initiative that's sitting off to the side or sitting over in corporate. And I think it's got to be a lens that is applied across care delivery, across benefit design, across partnerships that develop. And one of the examples that I'll share is that we're really proud of how we're embedding social determinants of health into our value based care models. So providers are supported in screening for things like food insecurity, housing instability, transportation needs with reimbursement to addressing these. And under these value based care models, the coordinated care team really proactively identifies a patient's needs and connects them with community based resources. We've partnered with local and national community based organizations to help identify those resources, to connect those resources and to get those resources directly out to the patients that need it the most. The other side of it is we're integrating equity into benefit design as well. So expanding access to things like transportation, over the counter drugs, nutrition support. Because I think it's really important to see these as not just nice to haves, but really as important healthcare interventions.

[B]

Member satisfaction is essential to thrive in today's competitive healthcare market. What experience or engagement strategies have proven effective for your organization? And what are your KPIs? How are you measuring success?

[C]

Yeah, I think trust and engagement really come from a number of things. Personalization, convenience and Whole person care. And so for us it starts with knowing the member. It's not just about knowing their diagnoses, but also their preferences, their barriers, their goals. We do things like use predictive analytics and segmentation to tailor our outreach and care coordination efforts. Because I think we all need to understand that healthcare is not a one size fits all endeavor. And so we want to dedicate those resources to the people that most need our help. And so on the engagement side, we've invested in both high tech and high touch approaches. Whether we're talking about virtual platforms like WSDO for social connectedness to in person events that happen live at our center, wall clinics that help to develop community and trust. And you asked about what those KPIs are and we measure our success through both traditional metrics like cap scores and net promoter scores. But, but we also look at the longitudinal engagement. So are members showing up for their preventative visits? Are they managing their conditions more effectively year over year? Are they able to delay or stop progression of their chronic disease?

[B]

Well, looking ahead, what do you see as the biggest opportunity for payers to lead the charge in transforming healthcare delivery and driving better outcomes for all stakeholders? How can leaders like yourself take a step in this direction?

[C]

Yeah, I think payers can be that connective tissue that bring together data, incentives and partnerships to drive value based care transformation at scale. And I think that big opportunity is for all of us to lean into value based care. Not just talking about contracts, but I'm talking about operations, enablement, aligned incentives. And when payers support providers with the right tools and the right workflows, I think everyone wins, particularly when we're talking about the patient. So we have seen real gains when value based partnerships are strong. We've seen our provider partners and our own clinics have smaller panels, their docs get more time with patients, there's more shared accountability. These practices resultingly have higher engagement, they've got higher patient satisfaction, they've got better health outcomes and better economics as well. And we've established proof points with both data and numbers. It's [e-mail] VBC we publish an annual value based care report. Also some issue briefs on new frontiers in value based care. And so I think it is about how we deliver better on the quintuple aim in healthcare. But I think it's also about creating sustainability in this healthcare system that is really straining under the challenges of affordability, not just for the individual, but, but also for the country as a whole. And so for those leaders that are listening that are looking to take that next step forward. I would start by asking, how is your plan trying to make it easier for providers to succeed? What are the ways in which you're simplifying data sharing? What are the ways in which you're trying to align those incentives? And what are some ways in which you're co investing in the tools that they need? I think that is one key way in which we all move from volume to value in a real way.

[B]

Well, Alex, thank you so much. It's been an absolute pleasure chatting with you today on the Becker's Pays Issues podcast.

[C]

Thank you again so much for having me. Really appreciate the opportunity.

[B]

My pleasure. You have a lovely day, sir.

[C]

You as well. Thanks so much.

[B]

Thank you.