UPMC for You and UPMC for Kids Expands into Central and Eastern Pennsylvania

PITTSBURGH, Oct. 5 /PRNewswire/ -- UPMC Health Plan's Medical Assistance product – UPMC for You – and its Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) product – UPMC for Kids – are expanding into several counties in Central and Eastern Pennsylvania.

In addition to 14 countries in Western Pennsylvania, UPMC for You is now available in 10 additional Pennsylvania counties: Adams, Berks, Cumberland, Dauphin, Lancaster, Lebanon, Lehigh, Northampton, Perry and York. UPMC for Kids is now available in four additional counties: Berks, Lancaster, Lehigh and Northampton, in addition to the 32 counties in which it is currently offered.

To facilitate the expansion, UPMC Health Plan added Berkshire Health Partners (BHP), Berks County's premiere Preferred Provider Organization, to its network of providers for Medicaid and CHIP.

The BHP network includes more than 3,900 physicians, over 460 ancillary providers (such as medical equipment suppliers and home healthcare agencies) and 15 hospitals located in Berks, Upper Bucks, Carbon, Northern Lancaster, Lehigh, Montgomery, Northampton, and Schuylkill counties.

UPMC for You offers comprehensive benefits for people who are eligible for Medicaid. At present, UPMC for You has over 130,000 members in 14 counties in western Pennsylvania. Over the past decade, membership in UPMC for You has increased more than 150 percent, making it the fastest-growing Medical Assistance plan and the largest Medicaid managed care organization in western Pennsylvania.

For 2009, UPMC for You was ranked by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) as the top-ranked Medicaid health plan in the state of Pennsylvania and 15th overall in the United States.

Pennsylvania's Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP) brought to you by UPMC for Kids is a state and federally funded program that provides health insurance to eligible uninsured children and teens (up to age 19) regardless of family income. UPMC for Kids is the fastest growing CHIP program in Pennsylvania.  

"We are excited to be able to expand our offerings to reach families in need in central Pennsylvania and eastern Pennsylvania," said John G. Lovelace, President of UPMC for You.  "Our benefits and services have made UPMC for You and UPMC for Kids the top choices for many in western Pennsylvania and we expect that will continue as we move eastward."

About UPMC Health Plan

UPMC Health Plan, the second-largest health insurer in western Pennsylvania, is owned by the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), one of the nation's top-ranked health systems. The integrated partner companies of the UPMC Insurance Services Division – which includes UPMC Health Plan, UPMC Work Partners, LifeSolutions (EAP), UPMC for You (Medical Assistance), and Community Care Behavioral Health – offer a full range of group health insurance, Medicare, Special Needs Plan, CHIP, Medical Assistance, behavioral health, employee assistance, and workers' compensation products and services to nearly 1.4 million members. Our local provider network includes UPMC as well as community providers, totaling more than 100 hospitals and more than 11,500 physicians in a 47-county region. For more information, visit www.upmchealthplan.com.

SOURCE UPMC Health Plan