New Research Suggests Intentional Human Connection Is a Far More Powerful Prescription than Pharmaceuticals for Managing Chronic Conditions

By Eli Goldberg - VP of Data and Innovation

Delivering timely interventions to better manage chronic conditions is a significant challenge. Traditionally, patients only receive care and education when in a primary care setting. Unfortunately, primary care providers are often reactive and prioritize acute care over proactive, long-term prevention strategies. These clinicians are bound by time-constrained visits and limited training in preventive care. They also don’t have effective tools to support ongoing patient adherence with care plans.?

Meanwhile, social determinants of health (SDoH)—including transportation barriers, financial insecurity, and lack of caregiving support—further limit access to consistent, comprehensive care for many patients. Consequently, early warning signs are often missed, and complications are detected and managed only when costly, high-acuity interventions are required.

As a result of this reality, the healthcare system has relied heavily on blockbuster drugs as the gold standard for keeping chronic disease in check. Specifically, statins and GLP-1 receptor agonists deliver significant cost-effectiveness by reducing hospitalizations and emergency visits related to cardiovascular and metabolic complications.?

Medications Fall Way Short of the ROI Hurdle

That’s where the good news ends, though. While these medications positively impact health outcomes, they have not been shown to achieve true cost savings. That is simply because the costs associated with these medications outpaces their financial impact. In the case of GLP-1 therapies, while there is no question these medications are clinically effective, their economic sustainability as a frontline obesity treatment remains uncertain because they are prohibitively expensive relative to their medical cost savings.

In one study, Medicare beneficiaries who lost 15% of their BMI through the use of GLP-1 medication saw their healthcare costs drop by $3,512. If we are looking at a population of 100,000 beneficiaries, that would be a cost savings of $351 million. Obviously, this is a tremendous outcome. The problem is that the annual drug spend to achieve this outcome would be $951 million. This yields an ROI of .37.?

All of this prompted a burning question for our analytics team.?

Our data gurus wanted to know how a prescription for Belle’s in-home care would stack up with blockbuster medications, both in terms of driving clinical improvement, as well as generating a financial ROI in the process.?

To be clear, Belle is not a drug. Our offering is more aptly described as a “therapeutic-as-a-service”. However, our in-home experience is regularly dosed like a pharmacological agent. This made for an interesting comparison for research purposes.

As a society, we've come to believe a monthly pill can solve all our problems, but what if intentional, monthly human touch and connection is more powerful?

To answer this question, we conducted a rigorous analysis using a retrospective cohort design. We analyzed data from 326,354 PPO enrollees between April 2021 and April 2024. The treatment group included 2,950 individuals who received at least one Belle in-home visit, while the comparator group, initially 68,302, was downsampled and propensity-matched 1:1 to create a balanced final cohort of 2,950 in each group. Propensity matching was based on demographics, clinical conditions, and medical history. We applied a Difference-in-Differences (DiD) framework to assess changes in clinical episodes and healthcare costs before and after the intervention.

You can view the complete paper outlining our findings by clicking the link below. But here’s a quick summary.?

Full Study

We determined that Belle’s in-home, preventive approach rivals the clinical and economic outcomes of leading pharmaceuticals used for chronic disease management. With early detection and targeted care, Belle consistently reduces costs and improves outcomes for a wide array of patients on par with a blockbuster drug. According to the data, the Belle program cut the chance of falls by 52%, major depressive episodes by 40%, skilled nursing facility utilization by 48% and ER visits by 14%

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And where expensive medications fall short in terms of overcoming their cost to produce an ROI, Belle’s services generates a 2:1 return.???

These findings carry significant implications of chronic disease management within Medicare. Retrospective studies indicate that at least 40% of the Medicare population meets criteria for clinical benefit and net financial savings through Belle’s program. This is comparable to those indicated for obesity and diabetes drugs. Nationally, this translates to $63.4 billion savings opportunity for the U.S. healthcare system.

While our findings are obviously limited to our own experience, this rigorous analysis demonstrates the clinical and financial viability of consistent home-based support for chronic disease. In our opinion, this is a meaningful outcome as the industry wrestles with escalating pharmaceutical prices and a snowballing prevalence of chronic disease among older Americans.?

As advocates and major health care groups petition CMS to expand Medicare and Medicaid to include FDA-approved anti-obesity medications, now is the time to ensure we take a measured approach to medication. There is no question that pharmaceuticals have an important role to play in chronic disease management. It is also fair to question whether we should be using them more conservatively while leaning also on solutions that prove they produce clinical outcomes while also driving down total cost of care with a positive ROI.?

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You can click here to view the full Belle study. If you are interested in learning more about Belle’s approach or diving deeper into the data specific to this research, please contact our team today.

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