Does Cigna cover eating disorder treatment?

Cigna covers a large share of its members through employer-sponsored plans, many of them self-funded plans that an employer designs and Cigna administers. Its behavioral health, including eating disorder care, runs through Evernorth Behavioral Health, the health-services subsidiary of The Cigna Group.¹ For eating disorder treatment, that means two things shape your coverage in particular: your employer's specific plan design, and Evernorth's behavioral health network. This page explains how Cigna coverage generally works and how to verify your benefits.

Does Cigna cover eating disorder treatment?

Generally, yes, when treatment is medically necessary, and federal parity law requires behavioral health to be covered comparably to medical care.²³ The 21st Century Cures Act of 2016 also clarified that eating disorder benefits, including residential treatment, are protected under parity rules.⁴ Your specific plan determines the network, cost-sharing, and authorization rules.

What to know about Cigna for eating disorder treatment

• Self-funded employer plans. A large share of Cigna members are on self-funded plans, where the employer (not Cigna) sets the benefit design and Cigna administers it. Self-funded plans are governed by ERISA and the Department of Labor enforces parity for them, so federal parity rules still apply to your eating disorder benefits.⁵ That can shape what is covered and how appeals are handled, so your employer's plan documents matter.
• Evernorth Behavioral Health. Eating disorder coverage, networks, and authorizations run through Evernorth.
• In or out of network. In-network usually costs less, but out-of-network is not necessarily much more, and a program can tell you what your plan would actually pay.

Levels of care

A Cigna plan can cover each step of eating disorder care when it is medically necessary, from outpatient therapy through intensive outpatient and partial hospitalization up to residential and inpatient or medical stabilization. Authorizations for those higher levels are handled by Evernorth, Cigna's behavioral health arm, rather than the medical line, and on a self-funded plan the employer's benefit design can further shape what is approved.

Verifying your Cigna benefits

The fastest way is to have a program verify your benefits for you. Call the number here and a licensed eating disorder program will run your Cigna benefits, see what your plan would cover in or out of network, and outline the level of care it supports. Since behavioral health sits with Evernorth, that check confirms your Evernorth network and any authorization it requires. How prior authorization, out-of-pocket cost, and appeals work is covered in verifying your insurance.

Finding a program that accepts Cigna

Search the directory and call to speak with a licensed eating disorder facility. EDrehab holds no contract with Cigna; the licensed eating disorder programs we route your call to are the ones that bill it.