(1) A health maintenance organization shall maintain contracts with those numbers and those types of affiliated providers that are sufficient to assure that covered services are available to its enrollees without unreasonable delay. The commissioner shall determine what is sufficient as provided in this section and as may be established by reference to reasonable criteria used by the health maintenance organization, including, but not limited to, provider-covered person ratios by specialty, primary care provider-covered person ratios, geographic accessibility, waiting times for appointments with participating providers, hours of operation, and the volume of technological and specialty services available to serve the needs of enrollees requiring technologically advanced or specialty care.
  (2) If a health maintenance organization has an insufficient number or type of participating providers to provide a covered benefit, the health maintenance organization shall ensure that the enrollee obtains the covered benefit at no greater cost to the enrollee than if the benefit were obtained from participating providers, or shall make other arrangements acceptable to the commissioner.

Terms Used In Michigan Laws 500.3530

  • Commissioner: means the director. See Michigan Laws 500.102
  • Enrollee: means an individual who is entitled to receive health services under a health insurance contract, unless the context requires otherwise. See Michigan Laws 500.116
  • Health maintenance organization: means a person that, among other things, does the following:
  (i) Delivers health services that are medically necessary to enrollees under the terms of its health maintenance contract, directly or through contracts with affiliated providers, in exchange for a fixed prepaid sum or per capita prepayment, without regard to the frequency, extent, or kind of health services. See Michigan Laws 500.3501
  • person: may extend and be applied to bodies politic and corporate, as well as to individuals. See Michigan Laws 8.3l
  • Service area: means a defined geographical area in which covered health services are generally available and readily accessible to enrollees and where health maintenance organizations may market their contracts. See Michigan Laws 500.3501
  •   (3) A health maintenance organization shall establish and maintain adequate arrangements to ensure reasonable proximity of participating providers to the business or personal residence of enrollees. In determining whether a health maintenance organization has complied with this provision, the commissioner shall give due consideration to the relative availability of health care providers in the service area.