Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan of Georgia among Top 5 Best Performing Health Plans in Region.Business Editors ATLANTA--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 13, 2003 Blue Cross Blue Shield Blue Shield A US not-for-profit health care insurer that is a reimbursement intermediary for physicians. Cf Blue Cross. Healthcare Plan of Georgia (BCBSHP) announced today that it has been named one of the top 5 best performing commercial health plans in the nine state South Atlantic Region. Based on the performance of its HEDIS HEDIS Health Plan Employer Data & Information Set Managed care An initiative by the National Committee on Quality Assurance to develop, collect, standardize, and report measures of health plan performances. (R)(1) Effectiveness of Care (EOC EOC Emergency Operations Center EOC Equal Opportunities Commission (UK) EOC Educational Opportunity Center EOC End Of Course EOC Epithelial Ovarian Cancer EOC Environment of Care (JCAHO) ) measures, this designation came with last month's release of the 2003 State of Healthcare Quality Report by the National Committee for Quality Assurance National Committee for Quality Assurance Medical practice A private, not-for-profit organization which has become the leading accreditor of managed care plans; in site visits, NCQA reviewers evaluate a managed care plan in terms of quality management, physicians' (NCQA NCQA National Committee on Quality Assurance, see there ). This report represents the culmination of a year's worth of measurement and data collection for Quality Compass(R)(2), NCQA's database of audited, plan-specific information on clinical performance, accreditation and member satisfaction from 513 commercial, Medicaid and Medicare organizations - collectively covering more than 71 million lives. The State of Health Care Quality report is an annual assessment and interpretation of key trends in the health care industry and their effects on the nation's overall health. Debuting in the report this year is the regional listing of the top 5 commercial health plans that performed best on the HEDIS Effectiveness of Care measures. HEDIS, the Health Plan Employer Data and Information Set The Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) is a widely used set of performance measures in the managed care industry, developed and maintained by the National Committee for Quality Assurance. , is a tool used by most of America's health plans to measure performance on important dimensions of care. The performance measures in HEDIS are related to many significant public health issues such as cancer, heart disease, smoking, asthma, and diabetes. Health plan performances in areas such as customer service, access to care and claims processing are also evaluated via a standardized consumer survey. Supported and maintained by NCQA, HEDIS provides employers and consumers with information to reliably compare the performance of managed health care plans. The South-Atlantic region (as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau) is the most extensive region of all encompassing nine states (Delaware, District of Columbia District of Columbia, federal district (2000 pop. 572,059, a 5.7% decrease in population since the 1990 census), 69 sq mi (179 sq km), on the east bank of the Potomac River, coextensive with the city of Washington, D.C. (the capital of the United States). , Florida, Georgia, Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, and West Virginia). "We are very proud of this recognition, which reflects the excellence of our network physicians' performance and our quality improvement program outcomes," said Bob McCormack, medical director of quality management at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia. "This is one more reason our members can feel secure about the quality of care they receive from Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan network of physicians." Earlier this year, Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan of Georgia (BCBSHP) announced the receipt of an accreditation status of 'Excellent' for both its HMO/POS (commercial) and Medicare HMO HMO health maintenance organization. HMO n. A corporation that is financed by insurance premiums and has member physicians and professional staff who provide curative and preventive medicine within certain financial, products. BCBSHP's HMO/POS (commercial) product has achieved NCQA's highest accreditation status since its initial submission in 1996. BCBSHP's Excellent accreditation status - the highest level achievable - was awarded after rigorous evaluation by NCQA of all aspects of the plan, including preventive health services, member satisfaction, physician credentialing and quality improvement. Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan of Georgia and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia, together, serve more than 2.3 million medical members. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia is the oldest and largest health benefits company in Georgia. Blue Cross Blue Shield Healthcare Plan of Georgia and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia are both operating subsidiaries of WellPoint Health Networks Inc., one of the nation's largest publicly traded health care companies serving the health care needs of more than 14 million medical members and more than 50 million specialty members nationally. WellPoint offers a broad spectrum of quality network-based health products including open access PPO PPO abbr. preferred provider organization PPO Managed care Preferred provider organization, see there Infectious disease Pleuropneumonia-like organism, see there , POS (1) See point of sale and packet over SONET. (2) "Parent over shoulder." See digispeak. POS - point of sale and hybrid products, HMO and specialty products. Specialty products include pharmacy benefit management A Pharmacy Benefit Manager (PBM) is a third party administrator of prescription drug programs. They are primarily responsible for processing and paying prescription drug claims. , dental, utilization management, vision, mental health, life and disability insurance, long term care insurance, flexible spending accounts, COBRA administration, and Medicare supplements. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia may be found on the web at www.bcbsga.com. Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Georgia is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association
(1) HEDIS is a registered trademark of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). (2) Quality Compass(R) is a registered trademark of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). |
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