OVERLAND PARK, Kan., April 3, 2006 (PRIMEZONE) -- E. Craig Keohan, president of First Horizon Msaver (www.FirstHorizonMsaver.com), has been called on by the White House to participate this Tuesday in a Health Savings Account (HSA) panel discussion on ways to make Health Savings Accounts accessible to greater numbers of Americans. In attendance will be President George W. Bush, key White House and Cabinet officials, and other industry experts.
Keohan is a pioneer in the field of medical savings accounts. In 1997 he joined Msaver Resources, which was acquired in 2005 by First Horizon National Corp. (NYSE:FHN). He currently serves as the chairman of the American Bankers Association HSA Council. First Horizon Msaver services HSA accounts for many of the nation's health insurance companies, large employers and distributing agents and brokers. The company is also the only provider of HSA administration through the association subsidiaries for the American Medical Association, the American Dental Association and the American Bar Association.
"Health care costs are rising sharply in this country," Keohan said. "HSAs invoke consumerism back into health care, which ultimately should drive medical costs down."
Since being introduced in 2004 as part of the Medicare Modernization Act of 2003, HSAs have been quickly adopted by individuals and employers who want to cut the cost of health care insurance and make more choices about the coverage.
According to the American Health Insurance Providers (AHIP), the number of individuals covered by HSA-type insurance plans has grown to 3.2 million -- a seven-fold increase since November 2004. Furthermore, 31 percent of those purchasing this type of coverage were previously uninsured individuals buying health insurance on their own. Thirty-three percent of the early adopters were small businesses not previously offering health care coverage to their employees.
While the adoption of HSAs has gotten off to a faster start than did IRAs or HMOs, many within the administration and the industry think that changes can be made to make these plans even more attractive to individuals and businesses.
The Bush Administration currently has several proposals before Congress that address issues with the tax code and price transparency and that are intended to make HSA-style plans beneficial to larger numbers of people.
Currently the Treasury Department projects the number covered by HSA-type plans to rise to between 25 and 30 million individuals by the year 2010. The President's HSA proposals, if adopted, are projected to increase the number of Americans with HSAs from 30 million to 45 million individuals by 2010, a 50 percent increase.
About First Horizon
The 13,000 employees of First Horizon National Corp. provide financial services to individuals and business customers through hundreds of offices located in more than 40 states. The corporation's three major brands -- FTN Financial, First Horizon and First Tennessee -- provide customers with a broad range of products and services including:
-- Capital markets, one of the nation's top underwriters of U.S.
government agency securities
-- Mortgage banking, one of the nation's top 20 mortgage
originators and top 15 servicers, which earned a top-10 ranking
in customer satisfaction from J.D. Power and Associates
-- Retail/commercial banking, with the largest market share in
Tennessee and one of the highest customer retention rates of
any bank in the country
FHN companies have been recognized as some of the nation's best employers by AARP, Working Mother and Fortune magazines. FHN also was named one of the nation's 100 best corporate citizens by Business Ethics magazine. More information can be found at www.fhnc.com.