Discount plan helps to cure schools' ills

Lisa Sauls hates the idea that schools are reduced to selling junk food in their cafeterias to make a few dollars.

If she has her way, schools will make enough from her company's new marketing plan that they can yank all the soda and candy machines.

And if Sauls' Reno-based company, The HealthWatch Group, successfully rolls out its program here, the company wants to expand into other markets.

The program is simple: The HealthWatch Group sells a health-discount plan in which consumers get a price break on prescriptions as well as dental, vision and chiropractic care.

Whenever the company signs up a consumer, it donates a portion of its proceeds to the Washoe County School District.

The plan developed by AmeriPlan USA isn't insurance, and it requires consumers to use health-care providers from a selected list.

As of last week, the provider list included eight dentists, 23 vision providers and 28 chiropractors in the Reno-Tahoe region.

But for consumers who don't have health insurance, or consumers looking to supplement an employer-sponsored plan that may have been cut back, Sauls says the AmeriPlan USA program has considerable appeal.

The HealthWatch Group hopes its marketing plan emphasizing the benefit to schools will give it yet another opening to talk with consumers.

The company will donate 30 percent of its initial proceeds from an Ameriplan USA sale approximately $10 to $15 per paid application to the Washoe County schools.

The plan is priced at $11.95 for an individual or $19.95 for a household.

Dan Neitz, an associate of Sauls in The HealthWatch Group, said the company's donation to the school reflects a portion of its future stream of income from the sale of a plan.

The schools don't have any direct involvement in sale of the AmeriPlan program, but they allow The HealthWatch Group to send flyers home with students.

The company launched its marketing effort this autumn with schools in well-off neighborhoods of west and south Reno neighborhoods that would appear to be well-covered with traditional health coverage.

Even so, Neitz said the company's pitch was well-received.

In coming weeks, The HealthWatch Group will begin rolling out its program into schools in middle- and low-income neighborhoods.

Sauls said the company's marketing materials all are bilingual, reflecting the large number of students in Washoe County who come from homes in which Spanish is the first language.

She said, too, the company has developed its marketing plan so it can be easily transplanted into other markets around the region as The HealthWatch Group grows.

Along with the cash that schools will get from The HealthWatch Group program, Sauls hopes that the effort results in healthier children attending school.

She cited figures from the U.S.

Surgeon General: Tooth decay is the most common chronic childhood disease.

Half of all first graders have cavities.

Fifty million hours a year of classroom time are lost to treatment of cavities.

Less than half of all children visit a dentist once a year and the figure is even lower for black and Hispanic children.

Given those figures, Sauls said, the problems with soda vending machines in schools are all the more troubling even if financially pressed school districts need the money from soda contracts.

"It's liquid candy," she said.

"Let's not have that in our schools."