Supporters of health care reform have portrayed insurance companies as insensitive and too quick to deny claims. In a recent television ad, Health Care for America Now, a group supporting the Democrats’ health care reform bill, says insurance companies get wealthy by denying those claims.

The group’s ad mockingly explains “how to get rich” by showing a “book” written “by America’s health insurance companies.” Chapter 3 reads, “Deny 1 out of 5 treatments prescribed by doctors.” A news release issued by HCAN attributed this statistic to a study released Sept. 2, 2009, by the California Nurses Association titled, “California’s Real Death Panels: Insurers Deny 21% of Claims.” (We checked another claim from the ad, about insurance companies paying CEOs $24 million per year, and rated it Barely True.)

In a news release summarizing the findings, the nurses’ group — an influential union — explained that researchers from its staff and its affiliate, the National Nurses Organizing Committee, examined data disclosed by insurers to the California Department of Managed Care, the state agency that regulates HMOs. The researchers reported that from 2002 through June 30, 2009, six of the largest insurers operating in California rejected 47.7 million claims for care, or 22 percent of all claims. According to the nurses’ group, during the first six months of 2009, PacifiCare denied 39.6 percent of claims; Cigna denied 32.7 percent; HealthNet denied 30 percent; Kaiser Permanente denied 28.3 percent; Blue Cross denied 27.9 percent and Aetna denied 6.4 percent.

MORE >>>> http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2009/sep/18/health-care-america-now/tv-ad-overstates-health-insurance-denials/