Ascension No Longer In-Network For UnitedHealthcare Insurance Customers
Fight over rates leaves thousands without access to prior medical providers.
Ascension Columbia St. Mary’s Hospital in Milwaukee. Coburn Dukehart/Wisconsin Watch
Ascension Wisconsin facilities are no longer in-network for those on UnitedHealthcare health insurance plans after the two companies failed to reach an agreement over reimbursement rates.
The change went into effect Wednesday.
According to UnitedHealthcare, Ascension is no longer an in-network provider for people with their employer-sponsored and individual commercial health insurance, with United’s Medicare Advantage plans and UnitedHealthcare Community Plans for Medicaid recipients.
After months of negotiations, Ascension and UnitedHealthcare are each blaming the other side.
A spokesperson for Ascension said reimbursement rates proposed by UnitedHealthcare are not enough to account for rising health care costs. UnitedHealthcare said Ascension demanded “unsustainable price hikes” that would increase health care costs for Wisconsin residents.
“We proposed multiple times to extend our current contract—even as recently as Sept. 30. This would have provided our members continued network access to Ascension while we continued our discussions,” UnitedHealthcare Wisconsin CEO Dustin Hinton said in an emailed statement to WPR. “Ascension refused and chose to disrupt access for its patients, presumably as leverage to help obtain the price hikes they are seeking.”
UnitedHealthcare provides insurance to more than 1.7 million people in Wisconsin and is the largest provider in the nation.
Easton Lockwood is a school social worker in Milwaukee and a UnitedHealthcare patient. She said she and her coworkers are struggling to figure out how to move forward.
“Now there’s going to be a mass kind of exodus of all of us leaving our Ascension providers that we can no longer afford since the health care was cut off. And where are we all going to go?” Lockwood said. “There’s only so many doctors and providers out there that can service a population quite this big, so it is scary for us all right now I think.”
Ascension, headquartered in St. Louis, has 10 hospitals, seven urgent care locations, and more than 100 offices in Milwaukee, Racine, Appleton and the Fox Valley. It is one of the largest health care systems in the state and country.
“The reimbursement rates UnitedHealthcare proposed do not adequately account for the significant financial pressures facing healthcare providers, including unprecedented inflation, and rising costs for equipment and medications,” an Ascension Wisconsin spokesperson said in a statement.
Ascension said it is open to continued negotiations with UnitedHealthcare if UnitedHealthcare is willing to offer contract terms “that support sustainable, long-term access to care for our communities.”
UnitedHealthcare said it is also open to discussions but is focused on supporting patients needing continued care or switching to new providers.
Ascension Wisconsin is no longer in-network for UnitedHealthcare patients after contract expires was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.
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This is so unfair for patients who have long term health care relationships with doctors, nurses, staff and nutrition providers!
It takes 2 to tango.
This will hurt Ascension in the long run.
I am a former Ascension employee and have no empathy for them. The year the coders got a 1 percent raise we were ecstatic
The management was always encouraging us to give, but the only folks who ever got decent raises were upper management. Most providers got frustrated management wouldn’t listen to them and left for different clinics.
Wonder how much longer it will last before it’s up for sale.
According to Forbes, UnitedHealth Group reported $22 billion in 2023 profits including $5.5 billion in the fourth quarter as its portfolio of health insurance and provider services grew by double-digit percentages.
So one question that occurs to me, Is Ascension being offered less for treatments than Froedtert, Aurora, and Pro Health by UHC? Without knowing that, I’m thinking that Ascension is the problem here.
I had a similar issue with Aurora and UHC having a spat back in 2004 and had to switch from them to Froedtert. Never looked back.
I just dropped United HealthCare. Will also be dropping Ascension. Both sides greedy and do not have any concern for patients. Apparently top Ascension executives put the catholic sayings on their walls while ignoring them so as to line their pockets.
Ascension is trying as hard as it can to abandon Milwaukee completely. Suburbs only for them.
1. No obstetric care at St. Francis – no childbirth services at all.
2. Limited obstetric care at St. Mary’s
3. No/limited heart care at St. Joe’s – – – this I could be wrong about, but they dropped some type of pretty critical care. They have also tried on more than one occasion to close St. Joseph’s completely – the city apparently prevented that.
They should be ashamed of themselves – – of course the leaders are all millionaires, so I guess they don’t care.