WASHINGTON (Nov. 13, 2007) – UnitedHealthcare, a UnitedHealth Group (NYSE: UNH) company, has been awarded the "Recognizing Innovation in Multicultural Health Care Award" by the National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) for its efforts to provide its members with culturally and linguistically appropriate health care services.

NCQA recognized UnitedHealthcare's interactive Asian-language provider directories that enable Asian Americans to seek care from a doctor or specialist who speaks their language. Available in Cantonese, Mandarin, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese, the directories can be found online at www.uhcasian.com. Together they list numerous physicians in California, Illinois and Texas, complete with addresses, phone numbers, affiliated hospital(s), preferred language(s) and specialty, if applicable. Physicians are listed by city and county as well as alphabetically for easier reference.

Each physician listed in the Asian-language provider directory is part of UnitedHealthcare's national network of more than 535,000 physicians and is available to all UnitedHealthcare health plan participants.

According to Amber Jia, director of UnitedHealthcare's Asian American Markets, many Asian Americans prefer to receive care and health information in their native language.

"UnitedHealthcare is committed to ensuring that Asian Americans have better access to culturally appropriate and linguistically accurate care that we believe can make a positive impact in the quality of care Asian Americans receive," Jia said. "Asian Americans who seek care from doctors who speak their native languages we feel are more receptive to care instructions and take a more active role in their health. This in turn can lead to improved health outcomes and a decrease in disease states that disproportionately affect Asian Americans, such as stroke and cervical cancer. We are honored that NCQA has recognized our commitment through this prestigious award."

"UnitedHealthcare has created an innovative program that health plans nationwide should use as a model for bridging language and cultural gaps that so easily get in the way of quality health care," said Margaret E. O'Kane, president of NCQA. "Creating a patient-centered, multicultural health care system must be among the highest priorities of providers and health plans alike."

According to the landmark 2002 Institute of Medicine study, "Unequal Treatment: Confronting Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Health Care," minorities in the U.S. tend to receive lower-quality health care than Caucasians, even when such factors as medical conditions, insurance and economic status are equivalent.

UnitedHealthcare received its award in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 13 during the second-annual "Breakthroughs in Reducing Health Care Disparities." The award arose from projects conducted by NCQA -with major funding from The California Endowment and support from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS)- to investigate the feasibility for health plans to provide culturally and linguistically appropriate care and to monitor health care disparities using clinical quality data.

For information about NCQA, as well as the conferences on multicultural health care, visit web.ncqa.org. More information about UnitedHealthcare's Asian American Markets, in Chinese, Korean, Vietnamese and English, is available at uhcasian.com.

About NCQA
NCQA is a private, non-profit organization dedicated to improving health care quality. NCQA accredits and certifies a wide range of health care organizations and recognizes physicians in key clinical areas. NCQA's Healthcare Effectiveness Data and Information Set (HEDIS) is the most widely used performance measurement tool in health care. NCQA is committed to providing health care quality information through the Web, media and data licensing agreements in order to help consumers, employers and others make more informed health care choices. For more information, visit web.ncqa.org.

About the California Endowment
The California Endowment, a private, statewide health foundation, was established in 1996 to expand access to affordable, quality health care for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental improvements in the health status of all Californians. For more information, visit calendow.org.