SATISFACTION AND CHOICE - A VIEW FROM THE PLANS

Communitywide surveys have demonstrated that managed care enrollees te nd to express higher satisfaction with their health plan if they have been given the opportunity to make a choice between managed care and f ee-for-service plans. This DataWatch shows similar results with plan-s pecific data, even for enrollees whose plan benefits include coverage for out-of-network services. That is, what matters seems to be choice at the time of enrollment, not at the point of service. Further, in th e practical application of ranking plans on overall enrollee satisfact ion, choice appears to be a more important influence than other factor s that may receive attention, including enrollees' health status. We d iscuss this phenomenon with respect to competition and strategy in the managed care marketplace.