The New York Attorney General's office has bagged another head for its trophy wall. Last week, UnitedHealth Group (UHG) became the latest health plan to agree to the AG's guidelines for running physician rankings program. In the agreement, which also applies to Oxford health Plans, UHG will meet criteria already agreed to by Aetna, Cigna and Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield, including full disclosure of ratings criteria to physicians and consumers, the use of nationally-accepted, risk-adjusted and statistically accurate rankings and the hiring of a "ratings examiner" to keep the process honest. Unlike the other health plans, UHG hadn't rolled out its rankings program yet. However, it plans to kick such a program off in New York and New Jersey next month. Our question: will other plans that haven't established ratings programs decide to hold off, given the probability that they'll end up having to meet the AG's standards?

To find out more about the agreement:
- read this Kaiser Daily Health Policy Report item [1]

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