CHICAGO (Nov. 21, 2007) — UnitedHealthcare and Advocate Health Care, the largest integrated health care system in Illinois, announced a new long-term agreement that will expand access to affordable, quality health care for nearly 1 million Chicagoland residents.

Effective Dec. 1, UnitedHealthcare commercial health plan members will have access to Advocate’s ten hospitals:

• Advocate Bethany Hospital
• Advocate Christ Medical Center
• Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital
• Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital
• Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center
• Advocate Lutheran General Hospital
• Advocate South Suburban Hospital
• Advocate Trinity Hospital
• Advocate Hope Children’s Hospital
• Advocate Lutheran General Children’s Hospital

In addition, UnitedHealthcare customers will have access to Advocate Home Health services, the 800 employed physicians in the Advocate Medical Group, Advocate Health Centers and Dreyer Clinic, and the independent physician members of Advocate Physician Partners. 

This new agreement further expands UnitedHealthcare’s extensive network to more than 19,000 physicians and 150 hospitals throughout Illinois.

“Our relationship with Advocate will provide UnitedHealthcare customers with broad access to one of the most comprehensive health care systems in Illinois,” said Tom Wiffler, president and CEO of UnitedHealthcare of Illinois. “Our long-term agreement reinforces our commitment to working together to provide consumers with predictable and stable access to affordable, quality health care.  This is exciting news for our customers in Illinois and Northwest Indiana.”

As part of the new agreement, UnitedHealthcare, Advocate Health Care and Advocate Physician Partners will collaborate on several innovative programs designed to promote quality care and support the adoption of health information technology, including an ambulatory electronic health record initiative designed to make digital patient records accessible and improve the quality of care and patient safety while helping reduce administrative costs.

“Advocate Health Care is pleased to be working with UnitedHealthcare to address the health care quality and affordability concerns of employers and consumers in Chicagoland,” said Dr. Lee Sacks, President of Advocate Physician Partners.  “We welcome UnitedHealthcare into our Clinical Integration Program, and we are confident that this partnership will lead to better health care and service in the communities we are privileged to serve.” 

About Advocate Health Care
Oak Brook-based Advocate Health Care, the largest health care provider in Illinois, is ranked among the nation’s top health care systems.  A faith-based, non-profit system, Advocate is related to both the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and the United Church of Christ.  Advocate’s 200-plus sites of care in metropolitan Chicago include eight acute care hospitals and two children’s hospitals, a home health care company and four of Chicago’s largest medical groups.  Through its academic and teaching affiliations, Advocate trains more resident physicians than does any non-university teaching hospital in Illinois.  For more information about Advocate Health Care, please visit www.advocatehealth.com.

Advocate Physician Partners is the care management and managed care contracting joint venture between Advocate Health Care and select physicians on the medical staffs of Advocate hospitals.  With a physician network that includes more than 900 primary care physicians and 2,000 specialists, Advocate Physician Partners is focused on improving health care quality and outcomes – while reducing the overall cost of care – in both the inpatient and ambulatory settings.  Advocate Physician Partners’ award-winning clinically integrated approach to patient care utilizes best practices in evidence-based medicine, advanced technology and quality improvement techniques. 

About UnitedHealthcare
UnitedHealthcare (www.uhc.com) 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 them broad, convenient access to services nationwide.  UnitedHealthcare is one of the businesses of UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH), a diversified Fortune 50 health and well-being company.