Springfield Area Network Update

St. John's Hospital in Springfield will join the PPO and POS networks effective January 1, 2003. With several specialized facilities, St. John's offers a wide array of health care service options. St. John's joins Doctors, St. Vincent, Abraham Lincoln and Passavant hospitals in Blue Cross's Springfield-area PPO and POS networks.

Also effective January 1, Memorial Medical Center will leave the PPO/POS network. Physicians in Memorial's HealthCare Network Associates will also be leaving the PPO and POS networks.
View the list of affected physicians.

Blue Cross PPO/POS members should be aware that:

• Beginning January 1, care you receive at St. John's Hospital will be covered at the higher "in-network" level.
  
  
• Beginning January 1, care received at Memorial Medical Center or by the physicians will be at the lower "out-of-network" level. Continuation of care is available for Memorial patients in their second or third trimester of pregnancy, hospital confinement within two weeks of January 1, 2003, ongoing cancer treatment and transplant services. Contact Member/Customer Service for more information.

Please contact Member/Customer Service if you have questions.

Advocate Remains in the Networks

Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois is pleased to announce that a two-year agreement has been reached with Advocate Health Care for the PPO, BlueChoice/POS, HMO hospital and HMO Illinois medical group contracts. We believe this resolution satisfies the needs of everyone involved.

We truly appreciate the patience and encouragement of our accounts, producers and members during what were, at times, difficult negotiations.

HMO Illinois members who have already contacted us to change medical groups may return to their original Advocate medical group by calling Member Services or using the online medical group change form.

Our agreement with Advocate does not affect members in the BlueAdvantage HMO network. Advocate Medical Groups previously scheduled to be removed from the BlueAdvantage HMO network will still be removed effective 1/1/03.