Employers have a unique opportunity to shape the future of their employees’ healthcare by advancing a whole-person approach to health. By bridging physical, mental, and social health, organizations can create stronger support systems for their teams. This integrated approach can lead to healthier employees, improved employee engagement, and lower healthcare costs — all while driving better health outcomes.
View or download the infographic below to see the value of a whole-person approach to health for you and your employees.
How A Whole-Person Approach To Health Is Shaping The Future Of Employee Benefits
From Fragmented Care To Whole-Person Care
Whole-person care paves the way for a new approach to healthcare.1 By linking physical, behavioral, and social drivers of health services, it provides employees with integrated support that addresses all aspects of their health and wellness.
Today’s Disconnected Care Model
Healthcare experiences extend far beyond the clinic or doctor’s office
Employees must navigate mental health, financial wellness, and social needs
Care remains fragmented
Employees are left to piece together disconnected services
The Whole-Person Care Connection
The whole-person care model treats employees as individuals. This model delivers coordinated care tailored to each employee by integrating these aspects and fostering collaboration among care providers, employers, and communities by incorporating:
Physical health
Behavioral and mental health
Social drivers of health
Why Whole-Person Health Matters
Integrated whole-person care improves health outcomes
Aligns services around the full spectrum of employee needs
Reduces avoidable readmissions
Supports employee engagement, productivity, and resilience
By The Numbers
0.5–2.7% reduction in preventable readmissions2
21% lower risk of 30-day readmissions with timely follow-up3
How A Whole-Person Approach To Health Helps Employees
A whole-person approach to health ensures seamless care across different care providers and settings, reducing gaps in care and helping to lower costs. Employees receive timely interventions and continuous support.
Older care models were fragmented, leading to poor outcomes
Treats the entire individual
Recognizes health is shaped by physical, behavioral, and social factors
Creates coordinated care plans aligned to individual goals
How Employers Can Support A Whole-Person Approach To Health
Employers can significantly influence healthcare outcomes by choosing benefits and partners that support whole-person care. Their decisions while designing their employee benefits programs can help to integrate physical, behavioral, and social needs.
Better employee outcomes
Cost savings
Stronger workforce
By The Numbers
Post-Acute Care: Millions saved through optimized utilization4
Palliative Care: $890–$3,480 savings per member per month (PMPM) across 200,000+ patients5
Behavioral Health:
20% reduction in suicidal events6
30% reduction in behavioral health spending PMPM6
Whole-Person Care And Technology
By connecting care providers, employees, and care teams through digital platforms like Anthem’s Sydney® Health app, technology allows for a whole-person approach to health, and at scale. Data sharing ensures care across physical, behavioral, and social health services is connected.
The Future Of Whole-Person Care
The whole-person care model is becoming the standard, with employers, care providers, and health plans creating care models that factor in all aspects of health.
Advances in digital healthcare and data-driven insights will enable earlier interventions, more coordinated transitions across care settings, and deeper engagement from employees in managing their own health. This creates unique opportunities that will help to boost workforce resilience, employee experience, and well-being.
1 National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health: Whole Person Health: What It Is and Why It's Important (accessed January 28, 2026): nccih.nih.gov.
2 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services: 2024 National Impact Assessment of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) Quality Measures Report (2024): cms.gov.
3 Centers for Disease Control: Outpatient Follow-Up Visits to Reduce 30-Day All-Cause Readmissions for Heart Failure, COPD, Myocardial Infarction, and Stroke: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis (September 26, 2024): cdc.gov.
4 Carelon: Facility-Based Post-Acute Care Case Study (accessed January 29, 2026): carelon.com.
5 Carelon: How Carelon’s Palliative Care services improve patient outcomes and provide value-based care (accessed January 29, 2026): carelon.com.
6 Carelon: Case study: success stories from Carelon Behavioral Health’s Suicide Prevention Program (SPP) (accessed February 2, 2026): carelon.com.