http://news.aol.com/article/booming-business-helps-patients-navigate/99530?cid=14
"It's a really interesting industry that's just taking off," said Carol Fischer, a spokeswoman for Pennsylvania-based Health Advocate, a 12 million-member organization.
Currently, the health advocacy business is an industry with about $50 million to $75 million in annual revenue but only about a half-dozen companies of any significant size, said Richard Rakowski of Intersection LLC, a Connecticut-based investment and development firm that has researched the field.
But those numbers have grown from a few years ago, and it may be on track to become a $1 billion industry based on the demand for the service, said Rakowski, the firm's principal.
The field is blossoming in the wake of cutbacks in corporate health benefits, an overhaul of Medicare and other changes that have forced medical consumers to shop more for medical care."
