Prior authorization delays elective spine surgery without savings to payers
By Admin | April 10, 2026
Key takeaways:
- Overall, 81.3% of patients whose care was initially denied had the claim reversed to eventually have spine surgery.
- Average delay to surgery was 15.7 days, with a standard deviation of 33 days.
NEW ORLEANS — Patients who experience delays in elective spine surgery due to the preauthorization approval process had prolonged pain with no cost savings for the health care system, according to data presented here.
“There’s a lot of hidden and indirect costs and issues that go along with the prior authorization system the way it’s currently set up. A takeaway from this study should be that we need to take a closer look and reevaluate whether or not preauthorization is achieving the aims it was originally set out to do, which was to decrease the variability in care, eliminate unnecessary surgeries and decrease costs overall. Because if it’s not achieving those things, we need to change the way that we’re going about it,” Rob Turk, MD, MBA, of Carolinas Medical Center, told Healio about the research he presented at...(More)
For more info please read, Prior authorization delays elective spine surgery without savings to payers, by By Healio
