Annual Wellness Visits (AWVs) are one of the most strategic levers health plans have to improve population health outcomes, care accuracy and member satisfaction. But despite their impact on risk adjustment, care gap closure, and member experience, only about 25 percent of eligible Medicare Advantage members completes an AWV each year.
Behind every missed AWV is a breakdown in data. When member information is fragmented, outdated, or incomplete, it becomes difficult to reach members with information that’s tailored to their unique healthcare needs and experience. Data gaps prevent precise targeting, timely outreach and meaningful personalization, all of which are needed to motivate members to act.
Many health plans rely on traditional referral processes or broad, one-size-fits-all approaches to drive outreach for AWVs. Often these tactics rely on inaccurate or incomplete member data. There are often missing contact fields or outdated demographics that can make it difficult for health plans to properly identify and reach out to members who are due for their AWV. This context gap can limit a plan’s ability to personalize outreach, predict which members are more likely to respond to specific tactics, and optimize their outreach accordingly. Generic reminders to “schedule your wellness visit” often fail to motivate action because they overlook the personal drivers of each member’s health history, preferences, and engagement patterns.
Reversing this trend starts with a data-first strategy, built on a foundation of clean, connected, and trusted member data. With this information, health plans are able to unify fragmented sources, resolve identities, and enable precision outreach that meets members where they are.
A strong data foundation supports:
- Predictive targeting that prioritizes members most likely to act or benefit.
- Personalized engagement that reflects member behavior, language, and preferences.
- Provider activation that integrates AWV promotion into daily workflows.
- Omnichannel orchestration that ensures outreach feels coordinated and consistent.
When contextual member data connects these pieces, AWVs become an active and measurable engagement opportunity that provides benefits to health plans, providers, and members.
Plans using contextual member data have achieved up to 3X higher engagement rates, improved risk score accuracy, and reduced disenrollment among targeted populations. The outcome is not just higher AWV completion, it is a better member experience that drives trust, retention and financial performance.
Improving AWV performance does not have to be overwhelming. The most successful organizations start with focused use cases, like enriching contact data or testing personalized campaigns, and scale from there. Each small step strengthens data integrity, engagement precision, and measurable ROI.
Embracing a data-first strategy can help health plans to turn Annual Wellness Visits from an overlooked metric into a meaningful engagement tool to close care gaps and build lasting loyalty.
Discover how to activate your members and drive measurable results.
Download the eBook: Increasing Annual Wellness Visits: Turning Member Touchpoints into Meaningful Action
