Judge OKs Prudential, Health Net Settlements

A federal judge has approved settlements that should help Health Net Inc. and Prudential Financial Inc. resolve litigation with 900,000 doctors.

Health Net, Los Angeles, is a managed care company that provides or administers health coverage for 6.5 million Americans.

Back in the 1990s, Prudential also owned a large managed care business, which it sold to Aetna Inc. in 1999.

In the late 1990s, lawyers filed a wave of suits accusing Health Net, Prudential and other managed care companies of working together to lower and delay payments to doctors in unreasonable ways. The courts consolidated the litigation in Miami under U.S. District Court Judge Federico Moreno.