-- For the Third Year in a Row, Each Earn Top Ten Distinction in U.S.News & World Report/NCQA “Best Health Plans” Review --

Providence, RI (October 26, 2007) – Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island, Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island and UnitedHealthcare of New England are again ranked among the nation’s ten best Medicaid health plans according to a 2007 joint report by U.S.News & World Report and the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA).

2007 marks the third year in a row that all three RIte Care plans have earned a top ten distinction in the U.S.News’ “Best Health Plans” edition. The rankings appeared today on U.S.News’ web site (www.usnews.com) and in the November 5 issue of the magazine (on newsstands tomorrow).

“We are very pleased that our RIte Care health plan partners continue to be recognized among the best in the country for quality,” said Gary Alexander, Director of the RI Department of Human Services. “These ‘Top Ten’ rankings showcase Rhode Island’s ongoing commitment to improved access and better health outcomes for Rhode Island’s children and families.”

The U.S.News & World Report/NCQA “America’s Best Health Plans 2007”* list was determined by data drawn from NCQA’s Quality Compass® 2007**, which publicly reports comparative results of nearly 100 Medicaid health plans. Health plan members throughout the country were surveyed on issues such as access to care and overall satisfaction. NCQA also reviewed health plans’ prevention measures, treatment outcomes and accreditation standards performance to calculate an overall quality score. More details on the methodology used to rank plans can be found at www.ncqa.org/bestplans.

“This ‘Top Ten’ designation continues to be an honor for our members, community health center founders, RIte Care practitioner partners and all of us who work to improve access to high quality care for all Rhode Islanders,” said Mark E. Reynolds, Chief Executive Officer of Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island. “Clearly, Rhode Island’s RIte Care model is among the nation’s best and more people should have access to this type of managed care delivery system.”

Average scores for Medicaid plans on most measures have improved steadily over the past several years. Particularly, the plans have been improving on a range of measures such as immunizations, cancer screening and treating asthma. These improvements follow federal and state mandates to report performance scores in these and other areas suggesting that public reporting of such scores is an effective way to improve health care quality.

“Ranking in the “Top Ten” is a further indication of the quality care that Rhode Island RIte Care members receive,” said Patrice Cooper, Executive Director, UnitedHealthcare Medicaid program. “We are proud to be recognized nationally for providing quality programs to Rhode Island’s mothers and children.”

The 2007 U.S.News/NCQA Medicaid Top 10 List

1. Fallon Community Health Plan (MA)
2. Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island
3. Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island
4. Capital District Physicians' Health Plan (NY)
5. Excellus BlueCross BlueShield, Rochester Region (NY)
6. Kaiser Foundation Health Plan of Hawaii
7. Independent Health Association (NY)
8. M-CARE (MI)
9. UnitedHealthcare of New England (RI)
10. Health Plan of Michigan

About Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island (Neighborhood) Founded in 1994, Neighborhood Health Plan of Rhode Island is a non-profit Health Management Organization that partners Rhode Island’s Community Health Centers and others to improve access to high quality health care. Neighborhood contracts with the state of Rhode Island to administer the RIte Care program, and has nearly 75,000 members. Neighborhood has been consistently deemed one of the best Medicaid health plans in America since the inception of joint rankings by U.S.News & World Report and the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) in 2004.

About UnitedHealthcare UnitedHealthcare provides a full spectrum of consumer-oriented health benefit plans and services. The company organizes access to quality, affordable health care services on behalf of more than 26 million individual consumers, contracting directly with more than 535,000 physicians and care professionals and 4,700 hospitals nationwide to offer consumers broad, convenient access to services nationwide. UnitedHealthcare contracts with the state of Rhode Island to administer the RIte Care program, and has over 30,000 members. UnitedHealthcare is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company.

* America’s Best Health Plans is a trademark of U.S.News & World Report
**The source for this data is Quality Compass® 2006 and is used with the permission of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA). Quality Compass is a registered trademark of NCQA. NCQA is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to improving health care quality.
*** America’s Health Rankings is published annually by the United Health Foundation, American Public Health Association and the Partnership for Prevention.

HEDIS® is a registered trademark of the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA).