subject: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida - Health Insurance Plans [print this page] Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida - Health Insurance Plans
Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida has a long history in the Sunshine State of providing comprehensive health care solutions to the residence. Inside Florida, the company history begins in 1944. That year the Florida Hospital Service Corporation started providing coverage in Jacksonville. This corporation eventually became Blue Cross of Florida. Two years later, a separate company formed under the name of the Florida Medical Services Corporation. This second company eventually they came Blue Shield of Florida. The two ended up combining in 1980 to create the new Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida. The company history of Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida goes back even further at the national level. At the national level, the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association indirectly or directly provides health coverage to over 100 million people in the United States. However, in the beginning Blue Cross was a separate organization from Blue Shield. In order to understand the full history of the company, you need to understand how each side developed independently.
Blue Cross began providing health care coverage in 1929. The focus of this organization was to cover the cost of hospital services. According to company history, the first healthcare plan they offered began at Baylor University in Dallas. They offered teachers at the school 21 days of hospital care for a total of six dollars a year. That coverage slowly extended to other businesses around Dallas over the next few years. The American Hospital Association took the Blue Cross symbol and used it as an emblem for insurance plans that met their standards. That was in 1939. In 1960, the Blue Cross emblem became part of the Blue Cross Association. Part of what would become Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida was part of this organization.
The basic concepts behind Blue Shield began in the Pacific Northwest in the early part of the 20th century. People in lumber and mining camps paid monthly fees to medical service groups in exchange for medical care provided by physicians. Officially, according to company history, the first Blue Shield came about in California in 1939. In 1948, the symbol extended to nine plans that came under the name of the Associated Medical Care Plan. Plan members eventually renamed the group as the National Association of Blue Shield Plans. The final form of the merged companies came about in 1982 when the two companies merged to become the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Florida was one of its members.
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