Cynthia Michener, a spokeswoman for Aetna, said her company is “disappointed the medical community has chosen to litigate on top of already pending consumer litigation on the topic.”

She added: “Both members and providers cannot be paid for the same claim under these cases. Ultimately, increasing health care costs increases the number of uninsured and the cost of health care for everyone.”

I discovered that there are two ERISA plan participant class actions pending against CIGNA in New Jersey federal court arising out of its uses of the Ingenix UCR database (Franco v. CIGNA, Civ. Action No. 07-6039 and Chazen v. Cigna, Civ. Action No. 08-4106). Cigna, which has not settled with the New York attorney general, was hit with an AMA class action (AMA v. CIGNA, Civ. Action No 09-578). CIGNA issued the following press release about that lawsuit:

The class action suit filed today by the American Medical Association and other physician groups reasserting prior allegations regarding purported flaws in the Ingenix database is without merit and will be vigorously defended.CIGNA used Ingenix data to determine reasonable amounts to pay for the small percentage of claims submitted for services provided by non-contracted health care professionals. CIGNA disclosed to doctors and consumers its use of the third-party Ingenix database as the basis of its out-of-network rate calculation. The use of the reasonable and customary methodology is a valuable method for our customers to manage costs and reduce upward pressure on the premium rates paid by individuals while maintaining access to a broad array of doctors.In keeping with the rest of the industry, many of CIGNA’s health plans give individuals the option of choosing to receive care from a physician who is in the company’s network or from a doctor that doesn’t have a contract and isn’t in the network. The CIGNA network provides access to doctors who provide high-quality care and who have agreed to charge reasonable fees for their services. If an individual decides to receive care from an out-of-network doctor, then the doctor is reimbursed based on a set, previously agreed upon, fee, and the individual is responsible for the difference between the set fee and the billed charge.CIGNA’s payments to out-of-network doctors are robust and fair, and greater transparency in regards to physician pricing will prove that point. For instance, for a 15-minute office visit in New York City – the most common service – health plans on average allow $74 to in-network doctors and as much as $160 using the Ingenix database to out-of-network doctors. Medicare pays $70 to in-network doctors and $77 to out-of-network doctors for the same office visit. However, on average, out-of-network physicians (who charge in excess of the amount previously set by the Ingenix database) charge consumers $214 – for the same service. More than 95 percent of office visits are made to in-network physicians today, and CIGNA believes that increased transparency around physician pricing will further support efforts to drive lower cost, high quality care.

All of these cases are pending in New Jersey federal court before U.S. District Judge Faith S. Hochberg.

Now, it has added content on the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act and the privacy provisions in the rules that implemented the Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act. For consumers, there also is new information covering such areas as medical records, personal representatives, health information in the workplace, court orders and subpoenas, and notices of privacy practices.

Based on 770,000 accounts for which the age of the account holder was known, the average age of HSA accountholders as of June 2008 was 44.5 years. Approximately 13 percent of accountholders were age 20-29; 23 percent were age 30-39; 27 percent were age 40-49; 26 percent were age 50-59; and 11 percent were age 60 and older.