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Provider Manual

National Committee for Quality Assurance

Last Updated on February 19, 2026

An overview

The National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA) is a private, not-for-profit organization dedicated to improving the quality of health care. The organization’s primary activities are assessing and reporting on the quality of the nation’s managed care plans. NCQA is governed by a Board of Directors that includes employers, consumer and labor representatives, health plans, quality experts, policy makers and representatives from organized medicine. Security Health Plan is NCQA accredited and has maintained accreditation since 2002.

NCQA began accrediting managed care organizations in 1991 in response to the need for standardized, objective information about the quality of these organizations. NCQA Health Plan Accreditation builds upon more than 25 years of experience to provide a current, rigorous, and comprehensive framework for essential quality improvement and measurement. It is the only program in the industry that bases results on clinical performance and consumer experience (HEDIS® and CAHPS®).

NCQA standards are a roadmap for improvement. Organizations use them to perform a gap analysis and align improvement activities with areas that are most important to states and employers, such as network adequacy and consumer protection. Standards evaluate plans on:

  • Quality Management and Improvement.
  • Population Health Management.
  • Network Management.
  • Utilization Management.
  • Credentialing and Recredentialing.
  • Members’ Rights and Responsibilities.
  • Member Connections.
  • Medicaid Benefits and Services.

The use of HEDIS® data allows the Health Plan Accreditation to effectively measure care and service performance. This focuses attention on activities that keep members healthy.

 In 2023, Security Health Plan received the inaugural Health Outcomes Accreditation for its Medicaid product line. NCQA awards Health Outcomes Accreditation to organizations that meet or exceed its rigorous requirements for addressing barriers that prevent members from accessing high-quality care. The Health Outcomes Accreditation focuses on the foundation of the quality improvement framework: having a data-driven understanding of the plan’s population and their unique needs and experiences; identifying and addressing gaps and disparities in care; providing services or resources that meet cultural, linguistic, disability-related and other personal needs that can be barriers to accessing appropriate and timely care. 

NCQA accreditation surveys, which consist of on- and off-site components, are conducted by teams of physicians and managed-care experts. NCQA uses measurement, transparency, and accountability to highlight top performers and drive improvement.