U.S. News & World Report on Friday issued its America's Best Heath Insurance Plans rankings and published several articles related to the issue. Headlines and summaries appear below."America's Best Health Insurance Plans: If Your Company Stumbles, What Happens to Your Health Coverage?": The article examines the health insurance costs of several individuals who recently lost their employer-sponsored health insurance coverage (Andrews, U.S. News & World Report, 11/7).

"Behind the Health Insurance Plan Rankings: We Looked at How Well Plans Prevent and Treat Illness and Satisfy Members": Health plan rankings include measures of member satisfaction with the ease of making appointments and receiving care, doctors' ability to effectively communicate and experience with claims handling (Comarow [1], U.S. News & World Report, 11/7).

"Health Insurance Plans That Hide Their Data: More Than 100 Health Plans Couldn't Be Ranked -- They Refused To Release Information": According to U.S. News, 126 health insurance plans declined to agree to release data on a number of clinical and patient satisfaction categories (Comarow [2], U.S. News & World Report, 11/7). The list is available online.

"What If Your Health Insurer Won't Pay?: The Smartest Tactic Might Be To Hire a 'Medical Billing Advocate' To Do Battle For You": The article examines "medical billing advocates," companies that "negotiate with health care providers and insurance companies to lower consumers' medical bills" (Raeburn, U.S. News & World Report, 11/7).

"America's Best Health Plans Honor Roll: The 20 Health Care Plans on This Elite List Outperformed Hundreds of Others": Based on a score from zero to 100, the 20 plans that scored the highest are ranked (U.S. News & World Report, 11/7).

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