Special Needs Initiative marks 5 years of helping families with complex health care

About 1 in 5 children in the U.S. has a special health care need. Support for them is often more complex and can create paperwork that requires extra time and energy — something these parents often lack.

Meet the Brennan’s

For more than five years, Kim Brennan has found extra support for her son Henry, with claims through the UnitedHealthcare Special Needs Initiative (SNI) — a program that gives families of children with special needs a personal advisor to help them navigate the health system.

The creation of the Special Needs Initiative (SNI) in 2017 aimed to help ease that process. That’s when UnitedHealthcare started using data algorithms to help identify families, like the Brennan’s, who may benefit from one-on-one assistance. Since its launch, more than 150,000 families have been helped.