Health Equity

Maternal Health: Rising preterm birth rates among African-American/Black customers in several of Cigna’s markets required action. We launched a maternal health program that addresses common SDOH barriers to care, including free implicit bias training for providers, and prenatal vitamins and aspirin for enrolled pregnant customers. Additionally, a Cigna maternity nurse works with customers and their providers to ensure evidence-based interventions (e.g., cervical length screening, progesterone, and regular mental health and depression screenings) are performed, and coordinates free transportation to prenatal visits and testing appointments for eligible customers. We plan to expand this program in additional markets.

Diabetes Management: We partnered with a Memphis hospital system’s community outreach arm to connect community health workers with vulnerable customers living with diabetes to help them manage their treatment.

LGBTQ+ Health: To address health disparities faced by the LGBTQ+ community, we’ve expanded our provider directory to include an indicator for self-identified medical and behavioral health providers with LGBTQ+ health experience and interest, offer transgender inclusion awareness training for Cigna staff, and provide additional LGBTQ+ resources to providers.

Case Management Solutions: SDOH screening is incorporated in all of Cigna’s case management programs to ensure customers’ unmet social needs are identified and addressed with resources to support SDOH

We are the first health plan to test and validate the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) distress screening tool to provide enhanced support to our highest-risk, vulnerable customers who were newly diagnosed with cancer or experiencing a transition in care. Since its initial use in cancer care, we’ve expanded use of the distress screening tool to include transplant and gene therapy specialty case management services.

Client Collaboration: We collaborate with our clients and customers to develop tools and resources that improve population health management. This includes direct support in the development of tools that help our clients target and address specific SDOH and health disparities in their workforce.

We've also created community resources for clients to share with their employees: National Patient Resources and FindHelp. These community resources are also available for providers to share with their patients.

Our Cigna Collaborative Care (CCC) model rewards providers who screen patients for SDOH and refer them to additional care that addresses unmet social needs. Additionally, providers are rewarded if they identify and address areas of health disparities and address these disparities. We’ve also developed an abundance of cultural competency and health equity resources for providers, including information on health disparities within African-American/Black communities, South Asian communities and Hispanic/Latino communities, as well as a SDOH Guide [PDF] for addressing SDOH within their practice.

We recognize that the digital divide exacerbates health disparities and are committed to the development of digital solutions that promote health equity and reduce the “digital divide.”

Understanding virtual care helps customers learn what they need to complete a visit and how it can benefit them in managing their health, whether it’s virtual or in-person.

Regardless of where and how our customers receive their care, our Language Assistance Services ensure clear, simple communication for families covered by Cigna with limited English proficiency (LEP) and disabilities to improve communication and health outcomes.  

Cigna’s transformative, differentiated approach to data and analytics enables customer populations to be analyzed according to our proprietary Social Determinants Index (SDI). This helps us understand the specific disparities a population may face based on their geographic location and enables greater understanding of inequities between subpopulations (e.g., gender, race, and ethnicity) based on claims data.

We also use the index to identify geographic areas with an increased risk of facing SDOH-related obstacles that negatively impact health outcomes and health care utilization. With this information, we are working to enhance our clinical program offerings, close disparities, and better serve vulnerable customer populations.

• Identify communities of Cigna customer populations whose overall health status and utilization are impacted by SDOH and determine if additional resources need to be deployed. 
• Identify customers who are at increased risk for poor health and utilization based on their residence and for whom personalized solutions may need to be arranged to achieve better health and affordability.

By incorporating the SDI to predictive models and case management programs, we’re improving our ability to identify and prioritize customers at increased risk for poor health outcomes and utilization, so we can then deploy additional support and resources to them to create measurable change.

We have a deep commitment to contributing to a society that is more socially just, healthier, and working towards health equity for all. Through our Corporate Charitable Giving and the Cigna Foundation, we support nonprofits in communities that provide important services and resources to address SDOH that contribute to poor health outcomes and inequity.