MDU’s Casement pinpoints scale and depth to differentiate MDUConnect

MDUConnect will provide additional member services of a scale and depth that will “really differentiate itself” from anything else in the market, the firm’s insurance director has told The Insurer TV.

In an interview to coincide with the launch of the MDU Insurance Solutions Campaign, David Casement discussed the MGA’s strategy and said the organisation was looking to increase its focus and reach in the corporate healthcare sector, having historically concentrated on individual clinicians.

The Medical Defence Union (MDU), launched in 1885, was the first medical defence organisation in the UK and currently has over 200,000 members, consisting of individuals and healthcare providers. Established as part of the MDU, MDU Insurance Solutions is a Lloyd’s of London coverholder, providing insurance offerings for healthcare organisations.

During the interview, Casement explained that the MGA’s MDUConnect product is made up of two key components, an insurance policy focused on medical malpractice as well as cover for areas including professional indemnity, loss of documents and breach of confidentiality.

“We then accompany that with a much wider range of member services,” Casement said, adding these services include 24 hours medico-legal guidance, support and advice.

“We have in-house lawyers, we have a huge number of medically and dentally qualified clinicians who work within the MDU, who’ve been there [and] done it.”

Casement also explained the offering’s additional tools, including a risk management toolkit designed to enable its risk advisory partners to work with insureds to “come up with a risk profile and then work out a bespoke set of risk recommendations to mitigate risks that they identify”.

“We have a product called Resolve, which is a proprietary complaints and incident management system which we give to every MDUConnect member,” Casement added.

“We provide a large array of educational services, we provide advice with Care Quality Commission compliance, and we also provide media and press assistance.

“It’s a very very wide product.”

Casement added the MDU had been providing services to members “since 1885” and establishing the MGA means the same proposition can now be offered to brokers.

“We want to be an organisation – and the MGA model enables this – that is offering really good member service and service to the broker community.”

Casement also addressed the challenges faced in the healthcare sector, noting that the UK’s National Health Service, for example, is under “immense stress”, but that the sector also faces other challenges.

“The scale of change, [it] always has been, but is significant, patient expectations are rising all of the time.

“There are a lot of geopolitical, economic and social factors which have led to huge claims inflation and we see that continuing, so the claims cost environment is obviously higher,” he said.

Casement concluded “there’s always been risk in healthcare” and what the MDU “does better than many is really understand the visceral risk environment in the healthcare sector and try to provide members with support to navigate through that”.

Watch the full interview to hear more about: