Breast Cancer Awareness
SUPPORTING WHATEVER YOU NEED
MetroPlus Health Plan president touts services for breast cancer survivors
BY ALEJANDRA O’CONNELLDOMENECH
When it comes to helping
breast cancer survivors,
MetroPlus Health Plan is
dedicated to ensuring that all of them
receive the full care they deserve.
“As an insurer we somewhat go
against the current,” said Dr. Tayla
Schwartz, president and CEO of
MetroPlus Health Plan, which covers
over half a million New Yorkers.
“We want to focus on vulnerable
populations that need health care,
the populations that need support.
We don’t shy away from them, we
proactively try to bring them into
MetroPlus . . . because we know that
we can provide them with comprehensive
support here, true hands on
what we call 360 support with whatever
they need.”
In order to ensure that members
are staying up to date with yearly
exams, MetroPlus Health constantly
checks member data to determine
who are the women who qualify for or
need breast cancer screenings. Once
the company determines that a member
should see a provider, they use
all means of communication, phone
calls, texts, e-mails, letters to get in
touch. In order to best communicate
with a diverse membership, the health
plan tries to contact members in the
language that they speak and boasts
a multi-lingual staff along with easy
access to language lines.
If for some reason a member is unable
to get in touch with her physician,
a MetroPlus Health employee
can call a provider and schedule and
appointment for her. To encourage
members to prioritize their health,
MetroPlus incentivizes women to
schedule a yearly mammogram by
offering reward points which can be
used to purchase items from the company’s
rewards catalogue. In order to
not just have the responsibility placed
on the member, MetroPlus also fi nancially
incentivizes doctors to make
sure that their patients are up to date
on their early exams.
MetroPlus Health understands that
it is not always easy for members to
make to a doctor’s appointment and
will bring health care to the community
by holding public events where
women can be screened on the spot.
In 2018, there were 37, 403 mammograms
performed on MetroPlus
Health members. The health plan
currently has 1,600 members undergoing
treatment for breast cancer, a
Dr. Tayla Schwartz, president and CEO of MetroPlus Health Plan, is a pediatrician by training.
number that has stayed stable over
the last fi ve years.
During member data analysis
and out in communities, MetroPlus
Health takes special care to encourage
higher risk demographics,
especially African American
women, to undergo breast cancer
screenings. According to the
Center for Disease Control, black
women are 40 percent more likely
to die of breast cancer than
white women.
“It’s very clear that any time you
want to make a dent in a health issue,
there isn’t one approach that works,”
said Schwartz. “You have to attack it
from multiple angles.”
A Doctor’s Passion
MetroPlus Health Plan is not your
typical health insurance program and
that is in part because of the passion
and care of Dr. Tayla Schwartz, president
and CEO of MetroPlus Health
Plan, a pediatrician by training. Dr.
Schwartz has known that she wanted
to be a physician since “the time she
could speak” and brings her need to
care for others into every position
she holds.
“We are tremendously lucky to be
who we are,” said Dr. Schwartz.
After serving in the military in her
native Israel, Dr. Schwartz studied at
the Sackler School of Medicine and
came to New York for a residency
PHOTO BY ALEJANDRA O’CONNELL-DOMENECH
in Pediatrics at Maimonides Medical
Center in Brooklyn. Schwartz
worked as a pediatrician at the Children’s
National Medical Center in
Washington D.C. and simultaneously
conducted basic research at the National
Institute of Health. Two years
after her fellowship, Schwartz began
working for a healthcare consulting
fi rm where she was fi rst able to view
healthcare “through a different lens”
and subsequently became more interested
in the business side of healthcare.
Schwartz has been president
and CEO of MetroPlus Health Plan
since 2006.
Schneps Media October 10, 2019 3