California Language Assistance Program

CALAP Key Requirements

Requirements for participating providers

• Comply with our CALAP if your contract was issued, amended, delivered, or renewed on or after January 1, 2009.
• Offer free telephone interpretation services to support LEP patients with Cigna Healthcare plan coverage.
• For free telephonic interpreter services, call the language interpretation line at 1 (800) 806-2059. Cigna Healthcare does not delegate these services to health care providers.
• Discourage use of family and friends, especially minors, as interpreters.
• Document a patient’s refusal of interpreter services in his or her medical record.
• Advise your limited English-proficient patients with Cigna Healthcare plans to call us for all translations of vital documents that impact their coverage. Cigna Healthcare does not delegate translation services to health care providers.
• Call Cigna Healthcare Customer Service to request language preference information for your patients (optional). Their written language preference must be registered with Cigna Healthcare for them to proactively receive vital standard translated documents in Spanish or Traditional Chinese.
• Supply the California Customer Grievance Form [PDF] and grievance brochure [PDF] to Cigna Healthcare customers who communicate dissatisfaction with the services or care received, a utilization management decision, or a claim denial.
  • Access the form and brochure in English, Spanish, or Traditional Chinese by going to Cigna Healthcare in California.
    • Go to Cigna Healthcare Grievance Procedure > California Grievance Brochure
    • Go to How to File a Grievance > Medical Grievance Form

Requirements for Cigna Healthcare

• Inform customers that interpreter and translation services are available free of charge in 15 non-English languages by including a language assistance notice in all of their vital documents.
• Offer verbal interpretation services in any language at all Cigna Healthcare and health care provider points of contact.
• Discourage use of family and friends, especially minors, as interpreters.
• Use qualified interpreters and bilingual staff who have been tested for proficiency, and are knowledgeable about health care benefit terminology in non-English languages.
• Translate vital standard documents into Spanish and Traditional Chinese, and proactively send them to eligible Cigna Healthcare customers who registered their written language preference as one of these threshold languages.
• Translate vital non-standard documents into Spanish and Traditional Chinese, upon the request of an eligible Cigna Healthcare customer, and send the documents within 21 calendar days.
• Post translated standard vital documents on the Cigna Healthcare website next to the English vital documents.
• Provide cultural competency and CALAP procedural training for all Cigna Healthcare staff that routinely interact with CALAP-eligible customers.
• Collect and store Cigna Healthcare customers’ race and ethnicity information, as well as their preferred spoken and written languages, in a secure database to ensure confidentiality.
• Assess customer demographics at least every three years to identify threshold languages.
• Keep a record of a customer’s refusal of interpreter services.
• Document, track, and trend CALAP complaints.
• Monitor CALAP compliance.