title: From managed care to consumer health insurance: the fall and rise of Aetna.
abstract: This paper documents Aetna's fall as the nation's largest managed care plan and its subsequent reemergence as a smaller but more profitable multiproduct insurer. The paper emphasizes the transformation in corporate goals, product design, organizational structure, information technology, product mix, premiums, cash flow, net income, and share prices. Disciplined underwriting and pricing have restored the firm to profitability and set the foundation for new growth. The implications for the health care system as a whole are less unambiguously positive.
authors.affiliation: University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health, USA. jamie@socrates.berkeley.edu
authors.forename: James C
authors.initials: JC
authors.lastname: Robinson
mesh_terms: D017598:Efficiency, Organizational; D008329:Managed Care Programs / Q000191:economics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D019982:Organizational Case Studies; D014481:United States