The Blue Options/Blue Choice Options plan continues to be a great option for groups to offer to their employees.

However, one of the main concerns members have is if their hospital is in the Blue Options plan.

To explore this, I tried an experiment to confirm if the hospitals in the large BCBS PPO network were all in the Blue Options plan.

Using the BCBS IL provider finder: 

  1. I created a list of all hospitals within a 100 mile radius of 60173 in the large PPO network. 122 hospitals were listed.
  2. I clicked on the name of every hospital on the above list to see what networks were listed.
  3. Most showed Blue Options/Blue Choice Options as a network.
  4. For those hospitals that did not show the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network, I individually checked under the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network. All of the hospitals on this list showed the large PPO network.
  5. Every one of the hospitals on the list in item 4 showed they were Tier 2 in the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network.
    • Advocate Lutheran General Hospital
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Lutheran General Children’s Hospital
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Sherman Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Condell Medical Center 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Illinois Masonic Med Cnt 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Hope Children’s Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Christ Hosp Med Cntr 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Trinity Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate South Suburban Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Advocate Eureka Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Streamwood Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Chicago Behavioral Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Northshore Glenbrook Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Central Dupage Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Northshore Skokie Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Shriners Hospitals For Children 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Northshore Highland Park Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Rush Oak Park Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Northwestern Lake Forest Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Northshore Evanston Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Loretto Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Delnor Community Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
    • Hartgrove Hospital 
      Tier 2: Participating Provider Organization
I searched the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network for hospitals within a 100 mile radius of 60173 and 60 hospitals showed for Tier 1.    When I clicked on Display all in-network providers, the number went to 122.

So, what does this mean for members?

My conclusion:

I could not find a hospital listed in the large PPO network that was not also in the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network as well. 

This means that members should have a very large pool of hospitals to choose from, like in the PPO network.

This is a great indication that members enrolled in the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options plans will not have issues finding in-network benefits at their favorite hospitals.

Please feel free to let me know if you have found any hospitals that are in the large PPO network but not in the Blue Options/Blue Choice Options network.

Patty Kretschmar, New Business Consultant and Author of Patty’s Perspective

847.631.6613 , patty@midwestga.com