You're budgeting for stage four. You could be funding stage zero.
Cancer is now the top healthcare cost driver for roughly half of large employers — and most of that spend follows late detection. Stage Zero gives you a managed program for the years before diagnosis: who's at risk, who's overdue, and navigation that gets screenings done.
Illustrative dashboard — your population's actuals replace these. De-identified, population-level reporting only; never individual health information.
Late-stage cancer is the claim you never saw coming. Early-stage is the one you helped prevent.
Stage at diagnosis is the single biggest lever on both outcomes and cost. Today, most employers have no visibility into the inputs: workforce risk and screening adherence.
Cancer is the top healthcare cost driver for one in two large employers.
Business Group on Health, 2024 Large Employer Health Care Strategy Surveyfirst-year cost of stage IV vs. stage I treatment, by cancer type.
Reddy et al., Curr Med Res Opin 2022 (SEER-Medicare, 17 cancers)of employers expect more late-stage cancers from pandemic-delayed screening.
Business Group on Health, 2024Most cancer programs work one of these. Stage Zero works all three.
Early detection is the headline, but it isn't the only place a screening program moves spend. Stage Zero pulls three levers at once — before, during, and after the screening.
1 · Higher completion
Human navigation plus at-home testing options, where clinically appropriate, turn screening plans into completed screenings. A screening plan nobody acts on saves nothing — navigation is what turns the plan into a booked, completed scan.
2 · Lower cost per screen
The same test can cost meaningfully more at one in-network facility than another. We steer members to the high-quality sites that also cost less — same clinical standard, lower spend on every screening, no network or plan change required.
3 · Fewer late-stage claims
Every screening that catches disease earlier shifts a future claim from the most expensive stage to the least — the single largest avoidable line item in the cancer budget, and the gap quantified in the economics above.
The same employee. Two different plans.
Maria is 44, runs your Denver office, and hasn't had a mammogram in three years. Here's how the next three years go — twice.
Maria's family history and screening gap flag her for outreach. A navigator calls, explains why it matters for her specifically, and books the mammogram around her travel schedule. Done in eleven days.
Subject line: "Don't forget preventive care!" Maria is in back-to-backs. She archives it, like most of her colleagues.
A finding at her screening needs follow-up imaging — now covered without cost-sharing, and her navigator books it within the week. It's early-stage. Outpatient surgery, a clear plan, her own oncologist.
Nothing is looked for, so nothing is found. Maria feels fine, and the plan's cancer costs look low this year — the risk is simply invisible, not absent.
Maria's out six weeks total, back full-time, screened on schedule. Her total claim would typically be a fraction of a late-stage case. She tells the Denver office the assessment took ten minutes.
A persistent ache becomes an urgent referral becomes a stage III diagnosis. Fourteen months of treatment, a leave backfill, and the plan's largest claim in five years — the one nobody saw coming.
Maria is a composite illustration, not a patient. Screening improves the odds of early detection; it does not guarantee outcomes for any individual. Stage-shift economics per the peer-reviewed sources cited above.
A whole-population program, not another app for the already-sick.
The outcome on the left isn't luck. It's a program — here's what's in it.
Whole-workforce risk visibility
Every employee has a cancer risk profile — most just don't know it. Validated clinical models stratify your full population, so outreach goes first to the people screening helps most. De-identified reporting shows you the shape of your risk, never individual results.
Navigation that completes screenings
Person-to-person navigation to guideline-recommended screening through your existing network — scheduling help, reminders, follow-up tracking, and escalation when results need action. Members keep their own doctors.
HRSA navigation requirement, covered — with documentation
Individualized breast and cervical screening navigation is now a federal coverage requirement for non-grandfathered plans. Stage Zero delivers that navigation with audit-ready documentation, so your compliance posture rests on delivery records — not just a carrier attestation.
Live in weeks, not quarters
No clinic build-out, no carrier rip-and-replace, no months of integration. Eligibility file in, communications out, program live in weeks. It sits alongside the navigation, COE, and oncology benefits you already have — it doesn't replace any of them.
Employer FAQ
How is this different from the navigation we already have?
The difference is the trigger. Existing navigation engages when a member calls in, or when a claim already in the system flags a gap. Stage Zero's outreach lists are generated the other way — from validated risk models and screening status, before any claim exists. That's a different population: the people who feel fine. We complement member-initiated navigation rather than replacing it, coordinate outreach to avoid duplicating your carrier's gaps-in-care program, and hand off cleanly when care is needed.
Do you provide medical care?
No — and that's deliberate. Stage Zero provides risk assessment and screening navigation. All screening follows published clinical guidelines (USPSTF, NCCN, and the American Cancer Society), and all clinical decisions stay with your employees and their own doctors. That keeps the program light, affordable, and free of conflicts.
What do you do with employee health data?
Individual health information is encrypted at rest and in transit and is never shared with the employer. You receive de-identified, population-level reporting only. Our privacy and security posture is built for HIPAA-regulated environments from day one.
What does it cost?
A simple per-member-per-month base plus performance-based components — priced as the thin layer it is. We share complete pricing in the first conversation, and we're happy to walk your consultant through it directly. No tiers to decode, no surprise implementation fees.
How do you make money — and does it create bad incentives?
A flat per-member-per-month base plus performance components tied to navigation activity and outcomes — aligned to screenings completed, not to care denied or steered. We don't take risk on treatment decisions and we don't provide care, so there's no incentive to over- or under-treat anyone.
How fast can we launch?
Typical deployment is measured in weeks: eligibility file exchange, communications planning, then launch. Mid-plan-year starts are fine — risk doesn't wait for open enrollment.
Find out what stage zero looks like in your population.
A 30-minute demo with your benefits team — bring your consultant.
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