There are many health coverage providers in the country and yet, it is troublesome to note that not all people are able to fully protect themselves and their family from unforeseen emergencies due to the increasing price of health coverage. Good for those who enjoy the opportunity to be part of group health insurance as they pay low or nothing at all. For most Americans, it is a shoo-in for private health coverage, or nothing at all.

While individual health insurance can be more expensive than group health coverage, it would be more costly not to have any coverage at all. To make the pursuit for the right medical insurance carriers easier, it would be ideal to look into their backgrounds and what they can offer to the people.

Here are the top medical insurance carriers as graded by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners based on their market share:

Unitedhealth Group

The UnitedHealth Group includes UnitedHealthcare, one of the numerous medical insurance carriers that supply millions of clients all over the United States. The Group provides insurance coverage that provide access to premium healthcare not only in the 50 states but also in other international markets. The joining of UnitedHealthcare and Golden Rule Insurance Company in 2003 has led to the delivery of health insurance solutions and innovative health insurance options to many families. One of the many complaints hurled against medical insurance carriers is the processing speed of claims. This carrier is proud of being able to process 94 percent of all health insurance claims in 10 working days or even less. Medical insurance carriers like United provide a toll-free customer service line for consumer concerns.

WellPoint

Amid all the other medical insurance carriers, WellPoint has the biggest membership of 34 million for its affiliated health plans. The company provides health benefit solutions and products including long-term care insurance, life and disability insurance and behavioral health benefit services and others. Health coverage is supplied by this firm to over 30 million customers via the Blue Cross and Blue Shield name. It provides many health plans including indemnity, HMO, PPO, hybrid plans for businesses, and receivers of Medicaid and Medicare. WellPoint has 37,500 employees as of 2010.

Kaiser Foundation Group

The Kaiser Foundation Group includes Kaiser Permanente which itself is made up of the Kaiser Foundation Health Plans, Kaiser Foundation Hospitals and the Permanente Medical Groups. With at least 8.7 million members all over the District of Columbia and 9 states, Kaiser is considered as the largest non-profit health plan in the US. It is known for providing an integrated health care delivery model to its members that includes emergency care, well-baby and prenatal care, pre-emptive care, pharmacy services, hospital visits and medical services. It has a network of 32 medical centers, 416 medical offices and 13,729 practitioners.

Aetna

Aetna is one of the healthcare leaders among the many medical insurance carriers in the US. They provide employee benefits, disability coverage, group life, pharmacy and dental plans. Aetna is backed by 154 years of tradition, having been started in 1850. It has a total of 34,024 employees and covers all fifty states. The company has 16.6 million customers and has a network of 4771 hospitals and more than 470,000 doctors and specialists.

HumanaOne

HumanaOne provides affordable health insurance plans and targets fresh college graduates, early retirees, entrepreneurs and people who are not covered by an employer. This firm aims to make insurance plans more inexpensive to these sectors by offering low insurance costs of up to 50 percent. As one of the largest publicly-traded health insurance providers in the nation, HumanaOne has a network of over 3,000 hospitals, over 350,000 medical providers and around 50,000 pharmacies all over the nation.

Knowing about the premier medical insurance providers will offer consumers an idea of what to look for while selecting their own medical insurance carriers including the quality of health insurance offered, price, and the total network of the carrier.