Bermuda to attend major US healthcare event following successful webinar

A recent webinar on the value of Bermuda captive insurers to US healthcare organisations has laid the groundwork for a delegation of industry experts to further promote the sector at a major annual conference and exhibition in Indianapolis later this month.

The hour-long webinar, hosted by the Bermuda Business Development Agency (BDA) on 30 September , detailed the changing landscape of healthcare risk management, particularly in the US, where the 2010 Affordable Care Act (ACA) or ObamaCare and other legislative reform has helped drive renewed interest in the use and creation of Bermuda captive insurance companies.

The presentation also gave an overview of captives and their benefits, attracting an engaged audience of mostly healthcare-related industry representatives. Featured panellists included Butch Agnew, vice president, Dyna Management Services; Oceana Yates, vice president, captives, R&Q Quest Management Services; and Anne Sousa, senior vice president, casualty healthcare, Aon Risk Solutions.

Now a team of more than 10 brokers, captive managers and other insurance, regulatory, and associated representatives, led by the BDA, will attend the American Society for Healthcare Risk Management (ASHRM) event October 18–21. ASHRM is a membership group of the American Hospital Association (AHA), with nearly 6,000 members representing risk management, patient safety, insurance, law, finance and other related professions.

The BDA will have a Bermuda booth (#724) at the popular ASHRM exhibition and the agency is also partnering with the Bermuda Society for Healthcare Risk Management (BSHRM) to sponsor a special lunch event for conference attendees, with cyber-risk expert Theresa Payton as keynote speaker. Payton drew a large audience to hear her talk on cyber issues at June’s Bermuda Captive Conference.

Dyna’s Agnew and Kimberly Morgan, of Endurance will also be guest speakers at the ASHRM conference, addressing the topic of future of healthcare risk-management.

“Our recent webinar highlighted the high level of international interest in the area of healthcare risk management, and provided a great launchpad for our upcoming attendance at ASHRM,” says Jereme Ramsay, business development manager at the BDA.

“Bermuda is a trusted, innovative partner in the healthcare insurance space, with an active reinsurance market that’s able to offer many professional liability excess of loss programmes. It makes our market a one-stop shop for those seeking solutions.”

Healthcare policy changes in recent years, particularly in the US under ObamaCare, have driven amalgamation of hospitals and other healthcare entities and expanded Medicaid coverage to millions more Americans. That trend has created greater demand for healthcare captives to offset the upsurge in potential risks.

Bermuda has approximately 40 professionals writing healthcare insurance and reinsurance for a full spectrum of entities; the market can also count among its advantages a solid track record of paying claims, access to Bermuda’s behemoth reinsurance market and capacity in the jurisdiction to write up to $400 million for any single risk.

“ASHRM is an important showcase for the Bermuda healthcare market,” agrees Agnew.

“It’s only second to RIMS as an annual insurance industry conference that brings together key risk managers, in this case, from major healthcare organisations looking for insurance solutions. Bermuda has a lot to offer and, going forward, its attraction in this sector is only going to grow.”