The doctor is in examining worksite medical clinics.

• Author: Stewart, Heather
• Position: Business Trends

Tn 2007 Donna Milavetz, a primary care physician, embarked on an "experiment" with Susan Johnson, CEO of Futura Industries: The two created an onsite medical clinic for the employees of Futura. Would it be financially feasible--or, even better, financially advantageous? Would it improve the health and wellbeing of employees? Would employees even use it? The answer to all those questions was a resounding yes.

Seven years later, that experiment has evolved into OnSite Care, Inc., which operates medical clinics for 15 companies in Utah and Arizona.

Indeed, onsite clinics are becoming something of a trend nationwide, says Ross Fulton, operations officer of central services for Intermountain Medical Group. He says large companies in particular "are going to take a hard look and probably gravitate toward this model in the future."

Does Size Matter?

Intermountain Healthcare operates onsite health clinics for six employers in the state, and it recently launched a clinic for its own employees as well. Fulton says companies need at least 1,000 employees to make an onsite clinic financially feasible.

Additionally, the companies should have a self-funded insurance plan. "If they're paying premiums to an insurance company, it's probably not in their interest to engage in an employee clinic, because if you're fully insured, you're not at risk--it's the insurance company that's at risk. So you're paying for the cost of the clinic, plus you're paying premiums," explains Fulton.

Milavetz, who is now CEO of OnSite Care, says she can implement a clinic for companies with as few as 200 employees. In that case, she says, the clinic will be staffed by a part-time physician and a mid-level practitioner.

"We always like to have a physician presence in most of our clinics," she says. "If it's on the lower scale--meaning less than 500 employees--we tend to use more of a mid-level/physician model. If it's more than 500 employees, we can very easily slot in a full-time physician."

Intermountain, on the other hand, relies more heavily on mid-level practitioners, which Fulton says is typical for onsite healthcare clinics across the country.

Another consideration is geographic location. If a company is spread out over multiple locations, an employer-based health clinic will be less convenient for outlying employees.

But Milavetz has found a way to overcome this obstacle as well: She developed an employer network. For example, one of OnSite's clients is RC Willey, which...