CIGNA First National Plan to Earn New NCQA Physician & Hospital Quality Certification for Programs that Measure Quality and Cost of Health Care

BLOOMFIELD, Conn.--(Business Wire)--
Marking another "first" in its drive to provide people with information about
the quality and cost of their health care, CIGNA (NYSE:CI) today said it has
become the first national health service company to earn Certification status in
all applicable markets for its physician and hospital performance measurement
programs from the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), under strict
new standards NCQA introduced in July of 2008.

"CIGNA HealthCare is to be commended for meeting these new Physician and
Hospital Quality standards," said NCQA Executive Vice President L. Gregory
Pawlson, M.D., M.P.H. "Meeting these tougher standards demonstrates a real
commitment to using reliable, equitable methods for measuring and reporting this
information."

"We are pleased to have earned this certification from NCQA," said Dr. Dick
Salmon, national medical director for CIGNA. "It means the individuals we serve
can be confident that we`re providing them with reliable and fair information to
help them in their health care decision-making."

Dr. Salmon noted that if all CIGNA enrollees used this information for their
choice of hospitals, on average they could experience 34 percent fewer hospital
deaths, 39 percent fewer hospital complications and 47 percent lower hospital
costs. If all CIGNA enrollees used this information for their choice of
specialists, they could experience a four-to-five percent improvement in
clinical quality indicators, a 29 percent reduction in hospital readmissions,
and eight-to-12 percent lower total medical costs.

CIGNA earned "Certification" status for its physician and hospital quality and
cost information across the 22 HMO/Point of Service and 36 PPO and Open Access
markets across the country in which this information is currently provided.
Previously, in 2007, CIGNA became the first national health service company to
achieve "Distinction" status for its programs under an earlier set of NCQA
guidelines for physician and hospital performance measurement programs.

The new NCQA standards under which CIGNA was reviewed have been endorsed by the
Consumer-Purchaser Disclosure Project, a leading group of more than 50 employer,
consumer and labor organizations, as standards that reflect the group`s
principles for health plans to measure and report physician performance. In
April of 2008, CIGNA joined this group in endorsing a national "Patient Charter"
that calls for full transparency of physician performance measures and
independent review of health plan physician performance measurement programs.

Health plans seeking NCQA Physician and Hospital Quality Certification must show
that they measure the quality and cost of services provided by contracted
doctors and hospitals using nationally recognized standards endorsed by outside
organizations. In addition, plans must prove they use the information in their
efforts to improve health care quality and share the data with their customers.

CIGNA offers an array of resources to help people learn more about the quality
and cost of their care. Some examples include:

* Information About Physicians - CIGNA provides information on quality and
cost-efficiency for primary care physicians practicing in internal medicine,
family practice and pediatrics, and for specialty physicians practicing in 21
different specialties. This information helps distinguish physicians within the
broad network of health care professionals based on performance standards under
specific quality and cost measures. This information is also used to identify
specialist physicians for the CIGNA Care designation. Employers may also choose
an enhanced option which gives individuals a modest incentive to seek covered
services from the designated specialists. The CIGNA Care designation and benefit
enhancement are available in 58 markets around the country.
* Hospital Value Tool - This tool is personalized to the individual`s plan,
providing star-based scores for hospitals on patient outcomes and costs for 29
procedures and conditions. The tool features estimated average cost ranges and
plan-specific average out-of-pocket cost ranges by hospital procedure.
* CIGNA Care Connections - In 2008, CIGNA introduced Care Connections, a
radically new online approach to help individuals get the most out of the health
care system by helping them find the right treatments and most effective
doctors, hospitals and medications. Care Connections completely transforms
CIGNA's conventional online directory from a physician and hospital lookup tool
into a more comprehensive physician, hospital and care decision support
capability. Using simple, symptom-based searches, Care Connections integrates
health information, quality information and cost of care, and suggests questions
to ask a doctor.

About CIGNA

CIGNA (NYSE:CI), a global health service company, is dedicated to helping people
improve their health, well-being and security. CIGNA Corporation's operating
subsidiaries provide an integrated suite of medical, dental, behavioral health,
pharmacy and vision care benefits, as well as group life, accident and
disability insurance, to approximately 47 million people throughout the United
States and around the world. To learn more about CIGNA, visit www.cigna.com. To
sign up for email alerts or an RSS feed of company news log on to
http://newsroom.cigna.com/section_display.cfm?section_id=18.

CIGNA
Amy Turkington, 440-934-5385
Amy.turkington@cigna.com

Copyright Business Wire 2009