Author: Andrew Cass

Amerigroup Tennessee, a wholly owned subsidiary of Elevance Health, named Natalie Cooper president. 

UnitedHealthcare and Phoenix Children's reached an eleventh-hour agreement to keep the system's patients in network with the payer. 

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas and Abilene, Texas-based Hendrick Health have extended their contract by two months as they continue to work out a potential new deal. 

UnitedHealthcare is not implementing a gastroenterology endoscopy prior authorization policy set to take effect June 1 and instead will set up an advance notification process for non-screening GI procedures.  

Florida officials are defending their Medicaid redetermination process after health advocacy groups asked Gov. Ron DeSantis for a pause after about 250,000 residents were disenrolled from the program, Florida Politics reported May 24. 

A minimum of 80 percent of Medicaid beneficiaries disenrolled from the program were booted for procedural reasons in nine states, according to a June 29  report from KFF. 

An alternative to UnitedHealthcare's imminent gastroenterology endoscopy prior authorization policy was rejected by representatives from three GI societies, who said that they were "not in a position to appropriately evaluate the UHC proposal with the limited information presented."

Medicaid work requirements were not included in a debt ceiling deal between President Joe Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, The New York Times reported May 29. 

Eight Florida hospitals can pursue a lawsuit against Cigna after a federal appeals court on May 25 overturned a lower court's ruling in favor of the payer. 

Pittsburgh-based UPMC's insurance services division grew from 4,033,737 total members in the quarter ended March 31, 2022, to 4,505,128 members in the quarter ended March 31, 2023, according its financial report released May 25.