Invoice Curry, 65, raises cattle on the identical land in rural Oklahoma as soon as owned by his father and generations earlier than him. Every quarter, for a number of years, he has made the 2½-hour drive to Oklahoma Metropolis for an epidural in his backbone to deal with his again ache.
However this yr, due to a brand new Medicare program, Curry has traveled a bit of extra usually.
In February, throughout one journey, he was informed unexpectedly that he wanted preapproval for the process. Then he went once more a month or so later to get the injection, for a complete of 10 hours on the street. His clinic wished him to come back in a 3rd time, which they’d by no means requested of him earlier than. That appointment was “just to fill out a piece of paper to tell them how you feel again,” Curry mentioned, so he hasn’t gone.
In January, Oklahoma grew to become certainly one of six states to start a pilot program testing using preapprovals in conventional Medicare, the federal medical insurance program for folks 65 and older or with disabilities. Medicare had beforehand eschewed the observe — often known as prior authorization — which requires sufferers or somebody on their medical workforce to hunt insurance coverage approval earlier than continuing with sure procedures, checks, and prescriptions.
Epidurals like Curry’s are amongst 13 medical providers topic to the brand new program as a result of the Trump administration says they’re susceptible to fraud or misuse. Powered by synthetic intelligence, this system — known as the Wasteful and Inappropriate Service Discount Mannequin, or WISeR — is meant to save lots of the federal authorities cash and shield sufferers from probably unsafe or unneeded care.
But early evaluations from Oklahoma and the opposite pilot states — Arizona, New Jersey, Ohio, Texas, and Washington — recommend WISeR’s rollout has not been easy. Sufferers, medical doctors, and different healthcare professionals who spoke with KFF Well being Information say the hassle has created confusion, errors, lengthy wait occasions, and stress. Some described the rollout as “horrendous” and say folks enrolled in Medicare within the pilot states at the moment are getting ensnared in the identical crimson tape as these with personal insurance coverage.
One key concern is that all of it occurred too swiftly. WISeR was introduced in June 2025 and launched in mid-January.
That was “quicker than normal” for the federal authorities, mentioned Todd Baker, who lately stepped down as CEO of the Ohio State Medical Affiliation. Medical doctors “just sort of had to figure it out,” added Jeb Shepard, director of coverage on the Washington State Medical Affiliation.
Authorities contractors have additionally acknowledged the speedy tempo. “We’ve had an aggressive rollout from the time of being notified to going live,” mentioned Jeremy Friese, CEO of Humata Well being, the seller for Oklahoma. Tech executives servicing different states have mentioned they had been nonetheless including options to their merchandise within the spring.
Abe Sutton, director of the Heart for Medicare and Medicaid Innovation, which is administering this system, didn’t touch upon the rollout schedule. However he mentioned in an announcement that the objective of those reforms is to make sure that prior authorization is environment friendly, quick, and streamlined.
“The model aims to reduce inappropriate care without delaying appropriate care,” he mentioned.
Mehmet Oz, the chief of the Facilities for Medicare & Medicaid Providers, informed NewsNation in December that they had been “rolling out some prior authorization on abused practices.”
“The purpose of these is not to deny care,” Oz continued. “It’s to make sure you get the care you need and deserve, not the care some unscrupulous doctor wants to use on you.”
Medicare has struggled lately with suspected fraud related to specific providers. The Division of Well being and Human Providers’ inspector common warned in September that this system’s spending on pores and skin substitutes, for instance, had surged almost 700% over two years, elevating “major concerns about fraud, waste, and abuse.” Pores and skin substitutes are among the many 13 therapies presently topic to evaluate below WISeR.
This system additionally imposes prior authorization necessities for kyphoplasty, a surgical procedure for spinal fractures, which a report by the Medicare Cost Advisory Fee flagged as overused.
Sutton acknowledged, nonetheless, that “the percentage of providers committing waste, fraud, and abuse is small.”
Customers and clinicians largely detest prior authorization. At the same time as federal well being officers check the method for Medicare, the Trump administration is making an attempt to scale it again for these with personal insurance coverage. In response to a KFF ballot performed in January, 69% of insured adults think about prior authorization a burden for care.
Via WISeR, medical doctors and their workers log in to on-line portals to submit medical data that justify the procedures. Utilizing synthetic intelligence, the methods shortly approve purposes that meet this system’s standards, Friese, Humata’s chief govt, informed KFF Well being Information. He mentioned there may be an “immediate yes” in 88% of circumstances for which medical knowledge helps an approval.
CMS has touted the method as one wherein choices are returned inside 72 hours. After that, clinicians obtain a “universal tracking number,” which permits them to schedule the process and receives a commission. In observe, nonetheless, contributors say the method is something however straightforward.
The College of Washington’s medical system alone had almost 100 sufferers ready earlier this yr for epidural injections resulting from WISeR-related delays, in line with an April report from the workplace of U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) that drew on hospital affiliation knowledge. “Now, patients are subject to delays or denials which did not exist prior to the WISeR Model,” the report mentioned.
Curry, the Oklahoma cattle farmer, mentioned he would possibly go to Kansas for future therapies to keep away from the approval course of. Dorota Gribbin, a New Jersey-based bodily drugs and rehabilitation doctor, mentioned that by the point authorization got here for certainly one of her sufferers who wanted a again ache process, the affected person had gone to the hospital for costlier care.
Jennifer Valle, a precertification and insurance coverage supervisor at Medical Radiology of Oklahoma, mentioned on the subject of kyphoplasties, there was plenty of “nitpicking” from reviewers. Different occasions, data her observe supplies to CMS will get missed, she mentioned, and reviewers ask for imaging that’s already within the file.
Claims with no issues are imagined to be paid inside 15 days, mentioned James Webb, a musculoskeletal radiologist in Tulsa, Oklahoma, who has additionally been annoyed by the prior approval and reimbursement course of for kyphoplasties. “Six- to eight-week delays is what we’ve been seeing,” he mentioned.
“It’s been horrendous,” mentioned Jerry Sobel, a Phoenix-area ache administration physician. “Right from the beginning, there seemed to be no organization.” Sobel mentioned that as of Might, he hadn’t gotten paid by Medicare for 9 epidurals.
“We continuously monitor operations and work closely with stakeholders to address questions and improve the provider experience,” mentioned Sundar Subramanian, the CEO of Zyter, which has the contract for Arizona.
Throughout an April webinar, one other Zyter govt acknowledged a big backlog in funds stretching to January. These backlogs “are currently being resolved,” Medicare’s Sutton mentioned, with out offering additional element.
When requested about different points — together with what medical doctors suspect are AI-driven errors — Medicare’s Sutton mentioned the company appreciates “feedback on provider experience.” It is going to be used “to help providers better understand WISeR processes,” he mentioned.
Though CMS distributors say people make the ultimate choices on approvals, medical doctors and their staffs consider synthetic intelligence is enjoying a big function within the course of and that denials are typically the results of AI hallucinations that garble or make up data.
One Arizona physician, who wasn’t licensed by his observe to talk, recalled a denial saying his affected person wasn’t eligible for procedures within the thoracic area, or mid-back. The affected person wanted an injection to the neck. Webb, the Oklahoma radiologist, documented 4 occasions {that a} affected person lacked numbness, and but his WISeR software was nonetheless denied, citing numbness, which, within the reviewer’s interpretation, would rule out the spinal surgical procedure process.
Friese, Humata’s CEO, mentioned he hasn’t heard about any AI hallucinations.
The method can also be elevating authorities prices. With extra rejections, extra appeals are being filed with Medicare’s administrative contractors. The federal government pays the contractors to deal with the appeals, and Medicare’s Sutton acknowledged that the company has “accounted for potential changes in the volume of Medicare appeals because of the WISeR program and its associated costs.”
Eighty-four % of business insurers already use AI instruments, in line with a survey launched in 2025 by the Nationwide Affiliation of Insurance coverage Commissioners, although they’ve constantly mentioned AI isn’t used to disclaim prior authorization requests.
Its use in Medicare dangers introducing friction and frustration into this system — and piling prices onto its beneficiaries. Prior authorization saves cash for insurers partly by making sufferers pay a worth in wait occasions and inconvenience, mentioned Miranda Yaver, a College of Pittsburgh well being coverage researcher finding out the method.
“People will end up getting ensnared in a lot of red tape, having to be on hold, and getting rerouted,” she mentioned. She usually wonders whether or not prior authorization merely shifts prices to sufferers and medical doctors, relatively than saving them.
Some medical doctors concerned in Medicare’s prior authorization experiment consider it is going to inevitably increase past a couple of providers officers in Washington think about fraud-prone.
“Everybody knows that if this pilot project works, it will be prior auth for basically all procedures,” mentioned Mary Clarke, a household observe doctor in Stillwater, Oklahoma. “If they can show that they can save money, then that’s going to be extrapolated and rolled out to other procedures and multiple other things in other states.”
When requested whether or not CMS is contemplating growth of its prior authorization pilot, Sutton mentioned in his assertion that there are “currently no changes” thought of for the checklist of providers topic to the WISeR program, “but CMS continues to assess whether any changes are warranted.”
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KFF Well being Information Southern correspondent Lauren Sausser contributed to this report.
