The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services announced Wednesday that 29 healthcare organizations have signed on as early adopters in a new cross-industry initiative to advance electronic prior authorization ahead of a January 2027 regulatory deadline.
The new Electronic Prior Authorization Acceleration initiative brings together health systems, electronic health record developers, physician practices, and digital health companies to work alongside major insurers that pledged last summer to streamline prior authorization. Participating providers include AtlantiCare, Bon Secours Mercy Health, Cleveland Clinic, Ochsner Health, and Sanford Health. EHR vendors joining the effort include Epic, Oracle $ORCL, athenahealth, eClinicalWorks, and MEDITECH, according to CMS.
The insurers that signed the original pledge — including Aetna, Cigna $CI, Humana $HUM, and UnitedHealthcare — remain part of the broader effort. CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz said Wednesday that while payers had engaged with earlier reform efforts, providers had been slower to act. Speaking at Axios' Future of Health Summit, Dr. Oz drew a contrast between the two sectors: "The payers, the insurance companies, have been playing ball. Guess who's not been playing ball until today? The providers," he said, as quoted by Axios.
The initiative focuses on integrating electronic prior authorization into clinical and administrative systems, reducing reliance on fax and portal-based workflows, and closing technical gaps across systems. CMS said in a blog post that prior authorization reform requires alignment across the entire healthcare ecosystem — not isolated adoption within individual sectors.
Under the CMS Interoperability and Prior Authorization final rule, certain payers were required beginning Jan. 1, 2026, to issue prior authorization decisions within 72 hours for urgent requests and seven calendar days for standard requests. Electronic prior authorization interfaces from those payers are set to go live on Jan. 1, 2027. CMS estimates the policies will save about $15 billion over 10 years.
Prior authorization has long been a friction point in U.S. healthcare. The process costs providers $20–$50 per hour and consumes an average of 13 hours per week — about $34,000 and 700 hours per year per provider, according to CMS.
The push to overhaul prior authorization gained momentum last year after major insurers pledged to standardize electronic submissions and reduce the number of services subject to the review process. The effort drew wider attention following the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Since making their streamlining pledge, insurers have collectively removed 6.5 million prior authorization reviews, a reduction of 11%, according to CMS.
CMS said the 29 organizations announced Wednesday represent an initial group, with additional participants expected as the initiative expands.