This year, larger payers, including UnitedHealthcare, Aetna, and Humana, made a number of announcements in early 2015, but news from these big companies slowed as the year progressed. By the last quarter, a majority of the news came from smaller payers. Throughout 2015, though, one clear trend among payers was the growing number of partnerships inked with remote visits companies, like Doctor on Demand, American Well, and Teladoc.

UnitedHealthcare made the most news in the second and third quarters of 2015.

In April, AARP launched a new research initiative, called Project Catalyst, where the organization will work with partners including Pfizer, UnitedHealthcare, and Georgia Tech to promote an increased focus on users over 50 in digital health research and development. The first project of the new initiative, focused on sleep and activity trackers, is launching at Georgia Tech.

Shortly afterwards, UnitedHealthcare announced a partnership with Walgreens, wherein UHC members in Arizona and Illinois have access to Walgreens Balance Rewards program, directly via their Health4Me app from UHC.

UnitedHealthcare also announced a number of partnerships with video visits companies. The payer said it would cover video visits from Doctor On Demand, American Well’s AmWell, and its own Optum’s NowClinic, which is a white-labeled American Well offering. The insurance company pointed out that the average price of a video visit is less than $50, and as part of its coverage for the service its members will still be responsible for a portion of that fee depending on the deductibles, copays, and out-of-pocket expenses associated with their specific benefit plan.

In the third quarter, UnitedHealthcare added new access options to its Health4Me app for Medicaid and CHIP beneficiaries in 17 states. Health4Me, which first launched three years ago for members of employee-sponsored health plans, helps users navigate their health plan.

Humana announced two new weight loss-focused partnerships with digital health companies this year.

Early in the year, Humana partnered with Weight Watchers to integrate the weight loss program into various services for members, including its HumanaVitality wellness platform. Humana will make the program available to its members in qualified employer-sponsored health plans.

Humana also  partnered with Kurbo Health, which offers a mobile-enabled program aimed at preventing childhood obesity, to give its employer customers the option to add a 12-month subscription of Kurbo Health as a wellness benefit for their employees. Before offering this option to employers, Humana conducted two internal pilots of the offering.

Aetna released survey data about members that use digital health tools and announced a partnership with a digital health company.

Aetna announced a collaboration with Newtopia that’s moved out of the pilot phase and into full implementation. Around the same time it updated its iTriage app by adding price comparison features for select users.

Aetna's iTriage group released data from a survey of 3,300 of its users — a sample of individuals who, as iTriage users, have already adopted mobile health tools — and found that only 48 percent of their iOS users use Apple Health. What’s more, 27 percent had never heard of it.

Cigna made updates to two of its apps this year and released data from a trial it conducted last year.

Cigna first announced updates to its health coaching app, called Coach by Cigna, which aims to help users improve their health by making healthier lifestyle decisions. Coach by Cigna previously collected health information either manually through the smartphone or via sensors in wearables like Galaxy Gear or Gear Fit to generate a personal health coaching regimen for users. But the new version uses “psychology of lateral assessment” to determine the user’s personality type, wants and needs, as well as preferences, so that Cigna can profile the user more accurately.

Then in the third quarter, Cigna Envoy, the insurance company’s app for American employees living abroad, added a mobile claims function that allows users to file a claim by taking a picture of a receipt. The functionality is mostly unnecessary for the domestic version of the app, MyCigna, because for those users claims are submitted by their provider.

Cigna also shared some data from a wearable device randomized control trial it conducted last year. Cigna found that 80 percent of people were more motivated to manage their health after using an activity tracker. The randomized control trial from March 2014 included 600 patients who were pre-diabetic and morbidly obese. The study lasted six months and used activity trackers from BodyMedia, which was acquired by Jawbone.

A number of the Blues also made news this year, and many of the announcements were remote visit-related.

In the first quarter, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts, partnered with American Well to pilot the company’s video visits offering, called WellConnection, with two physician groups, Emerson Physician Hospital Organization (Emerson PHO) and Lowell General Physician Hospital Organization (LGPHO). BCBSMA nurse care managers will also pilot the offering with members.

And Independence Blue Cross Center for Health Care Innovation invested $2.4 million in West Conshohocken, Pennsylvania-based chronic care app developer CareCam Health Systems. Independence Blue Cross plans to work with CareCam to develop programs that aim to improve the care of people with chronic health conditions. CareCam’s initial rollout with Independence is focused on supporting members with diabetes and asthma.

Towards the end of the year, Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey announced that it tapped AbilTo to offer members the option to participate in therapy sessions via phone or video after they've experienced a cardiac event.

CareFirst BlueCross BlueShield, announced it is investing heavily in bringing telemedicine to those who might otherwise not have access to it. The payer, which covers Maryland, northern Virginia, and the District of Columbia, is offering $3 million in grants to non-profit organizations and government entities for "innovative programs using telemedicine to improve access to health care and increase efficiency". Specifically, they're looking for proposals that focus on interactions between provider and patient.

And Tandigm Health, a venture launched in April 2014 by Independence Blue Cross and DaVita HealthCare Partners, which manages physician practices in Pennsylvania, partnered with video visits service TouchCare.
Some of the payers also added other digital health offerings to its plans for members.

Los Angeles-based Heal, which has developed an app that helps people request a doctor to visit their house, announced that it is now in-network with Anthem Blue Cross of California. Heal members in California who are large or small group Anthem Blue Cross of California PPO plan members can pay a co-pay, often between $10 and $30 instead of paying Heal's $99 fee.

Early in the year, Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan inked a deal with WebMD’s Health Services this year to offer members a digital health and wellness program. Blue Cross and Blue Care Network members will also have access to a portion of this new program. These tools were added to BCBS of Michigan’s wellness program, which allows members to check their coverage, monitor claims activity, and shop for doctors as well as health care services.

Meanwhile, Blue Cross of Idaho launched an app, available on iOS and Android devices, for its members so they have access to information about their healthcare plan. Members are able to log in to the app to see their plan benefits, find in-network or out-of-network doctors, and access their member ID cards. Users can also search for providers and urgent care centers by location, name, or specialty, view benefits details, and check their annual deductible.

VSP Global, a business that operates vision benefits plan VSP Vision Care as well as several other eye care companies, built a pair of glasses with activity tracking sensors built in. The project, called Project Genesis, comes out of VSP’s innovation lab The Shop.

A few employee wellness and health benefits companies also made moves this year.

Fitbit’s Corporate Wellness arm officially became a HIPAA compliant platform and it announced Target as a new client, which will offer Fitbits to its 335,000 US employees. The company showed off a new software offering that will facilitate fitness competitions among employees in large, distributed companies.

Later in the year, Fitbit announced that it had added a premium software feature to its program, called Corporate Challenges. The move added additional momentum to Fitbit's enterprise-focused business, which recently added Target as a customer. The company also announced a number of new enterprise customers including Aon Service Corporation, Barclays, BMC Software, Boston College, Emory University and Emory Healthcare, GoDaddy.com, and Gonzaga University.

In Teladoc's second quarter earnings call, the telemedicine company said it made $18.3 million in the second quarter. Subscription fees, paid to Teladoc by employee and health plan customers, made up about $15 million, while visit fees, paid by patients, made up just $3 million. Interestingly, while subscription fee revenue increased by 70 percent over last year, visit fee revenue jumped 127 percent — suggesting that not only the number of covered lives increased, but the number of visits per covered individual rose as well.

But a few months later, news broke that Highmark, a health insurer in Western Pennsylvania, chose not renew contracts that represented $1.5 million in annual revenue for Teladoc, or 3.6 percent of Teladoc's projected 2016 membership.

Another digital health company, Wildflower Health, announced that its pregnancy tracking app was made available to Medicaid populations in Louisiana and Texas. The company reported that prior to these recent rollouts, its offering, called Due Date Plus, was available to 2 million people across its existing commercial and Medicaid plans.

Omada Health, the digital health company that's created a remote, digital version of the Diabetes Prevention Program, released data from a cohort of 500 Medicare Advantage beneficiaries with an average age of 70. The cohort had access to Omada Health via Humana, which has worked with Omada for some time and recently made a strategic investment in the company.

And Health Care Cost Institute (HCCI), a non-profit organization, launched a price transparency website, called Guroo, to help consumers find national, state, and local pricing information for common health conditions and services. The data is collected from 40 million anonymized members of four health insurers: Aetna, Assurant Health, Humana, and UnitedHealthcare.