2010 Managed Health Care Plan Report Card

Introduction

Public reporting of health care information is a critical priority of the Vermont Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration. Each year, the Department publishes this managed health plan report card so consumers can compare the performance of managed health plans in Vermont.

Health Plan Results

The Health Plan Report Card uses the following abbreviations to identify Vermont health plans:
Shown As Insurer Plan Name
BCBS POS Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont Vermont Health Partnership
BCBS PPO Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont Vermont Freedom Plan
CIGNA POS CIGNA HealthCare Network/Point-of-Service
CIGNA PPO CIGNA HealthCare CIGNA PPO
MVP HMO MVP Health Care MVP HMO
MVP PPO MVP Health Care MVP PPO
TVHP HMO The Vermont Health Plan BlueCare

 

Click on the following link to see how Vermont health plans performed during the most recent reporting period for measures of Experience of Care and Service, Preventive Care, Acute Illness Care and Chronic Illness Care. Each health plan’s score is compared to the national average and the New England average, which is often higher than the national average.  

Click on the following link to see how Vermont health plans performed over time for measures of Experience of Care and Service, Preventive Care, Acute Illness Care, and Chronic Illness Care. These measures were selected because there were enough years of data to measure changes in performance.    

About The Information In This Report Card

The information in this report card comes from the opinions of consumers and from health plan records. For some measures, consumers’ opinions and experiences were collected in the spring of 2010 using a confidential member satisfaction survey known as the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS®), which is a program of the U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ).

For other measures, health plans reported information from their records about the services they provided during 2009, using a standard set of measures called the Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set, or HEDIS®. HEDIS® is a widely used set of clinical quality measures that requires plans to collect information in a way that allows for fair comparisons. HEDIS® is developed and maintained by The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), a non-profit organization dedicated to improving health care quality.

Can I trust this information? Yes. The health plans did not administer the CAHPS® survey to their members. Instead, an independent organization, certified by NCQA, administered the survey and provided the results to each health plan. In much the same way that financial information can be audited to make sure it is accurate, independent organizations used nationally-recognized audit standards to check the HEDIS® results reported by the health plans. HEDIS® requires health plans to collect information in the same way so that the plans can be compared fairly.

More Information

For more information about Vermont hospital and health plan performance or information about your rights if your health plan denies coverage, click on one of the links below:

Credits and Disclaimer

Credits:

CAHPS® is a registered trademark of the Agency of Healthcare Research and Quality.
HEDIS® is a registered trademark of the National Committee for Quality Assurance.

Sources and Disclaimer:

National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), Washington, D.C.: HEDIS® 2010, Technical Specifications, Volume Two. The source for national data contained in this publication is Quality Compass® and is used with the permission of NCQA. Any analysis, interpretation or conclusion based on this data is solely that of the authors and NCQA specifically disclaims responsibility for any such analysis, interpretation or conclusion. Quality Compass® is a registered trademark of NCQA.