CaliforniaCare Health Plans receives NCQA One-Year Accreditation.WOODLAND HILLS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 19, 1996-- CaliforniaCare Health Plans, one of the largest health maintenance organizations in the state, Thursday announced that the CaliforniaCare 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, was awarded One-Year Accreditation from 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 ). One-Year Accreditation is granted to health plans that have well-established quality improvement programs and meet most NCQA standards. NCQA is an independent, not-for-profit organization that evaluates managed care organizations. NCQA's mission is to provide information that enables purchasers and consumers of managed health care to distinguish among plans based on quality, thereby allowing them to make more informed decisions. "This supports our belief that we're doing the `right things right'," said Jeffrey Rideout, M.D., vice president of quality management, Blue Cross of California. "CaliforniaCare will continue to provide high quality health care to our members, and we will continue our work to maintain and improve our accreditation status." NCQA's Standards for Accreditation -- developed by employers, unions and health plans -- are demanding and are purposely set high to encourage health plans to continuously enhance their quality. There are 50 standards for quality, including the following six categories: Quality Improvement, Physician Qualifications and Evaluation, Members' Rights and Responsibilities, Preventive Health Services health services Managed care The benefits covered under a health contract , Utilization Management, and Medical Records. CaliforniaCare Health Plans is an HMO that offers health coverage under the name, Blue Cross of California. Blue Cross of California, serving approximately 3.4 million members, is the California operating subsidiary of WellPoint Health Networks Inc. (NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange :WLP WLP WebLogic Portal (Bea Systems) WLP Wafer Level Packaging WLP Women's Learning Partnership (Bethesda, MD) WLP Workplace Learning & Performance WLP World Library Partnership, Inc. ), one of the nation's largest publicly traded managed care companies. WellPoint offers a comprehensive array of health plans provided through health maintenance organizations, preferred provider organizations and specialty managed health care networks. 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, vision, mental health, life and disability insurance, flexible spending accounts, COBRA administration and 24-hour integrated, network-based workers' compensation. CONTACT: Cynthia Coulter, 818/703-3046 (media contact) John Cygul, 818/703-4321 (investor contact) |
|
||||||||||||||
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion