C’mon, how bad can United Healthcare be? This website (quoted by US News and World Report) uses federal data to calculate denial rates for various US insurance companies. Here they are. I calculate statistical averages and measures of dispersion:
| UnitedHealthcare | 32% |
|---|---|
| Medica | 27% |
| Anthem | 23% |
| Aetna | 20% |
| CareSource | 20% |
| Molina | 19% |
| Cigna | 18% |
| BCBS | 17% |
| Ambetter | 14% |
| Oscar Health | 12% |
| Kaiser Permanente | 7% |
| mean | 19% |
| median | 19% |
| stdev | 6.9% |
Yup, United Healthcare is the worst. They are 1.7 times worse than the industry average, and almost 2 standard deviations worse than the average for those with some statistical background. That’s… bad. Kaiser Permanente is a large operation. They have a complicated structure where branches are for-profit, while the overarching organization is not-for-profit. Anyway, 7% is a reasonable baseline for quality care: United Healthcare is over four and a half times worse.
The Anthem Blue Cross data is separated out form other Blue Cross data.
JFC.