UnitedHealth shifts strategy with its massive physician network

After assembling the largest collection of doctors in the U.S., UnitedHealth Group is switching strategies in an effort to improve its financial performance.

The company plans to revamp its enterprise of 90,000 clinicians into one more heavily weighted toward employed physicians, rather than affiliated doctors, executives said on Tuesday. That would allow the company to exert more control over them in ways that benefit the conglomerate, experts told STAT.

Stephen Hemsley, UnitedHealth’s new CEO as of May, said on the company’s third-quarter earnings call that UnitedHealth also plans to both trim the number of doctors in its Optum Health network and pull out from some geographic markets.

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