Healthcare Provider Organizations Saw Net Revenue Losses From Final Denials and Bad Debt Grow by 25% in 2025, According to Kodiak Solutions’ Proprietary Data

INDIANAPOLIS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Mar 31, 2026--

The more than 2,300 hospitals on the Kodiak platform lost more than $48 billon in net revenue in 2025 to final denials from payors and uncollected amounts owed by patients, up from $38.6 billion in 2024, according to the latest Kodiak Solutions Revenue Cycle Analytics benchmarking analysis.

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The 25% increase in net revenue leakage was driven by increases in the median final denial rate, from 2.5% in 2024 to 2.7% in 2025, and the median bad debt rate, from 1.1% in 2024 to 1.3% in 2025.

Clinical denial rates—covering denials for lack of precertifications or prior authorizations and for medical necessity—accounted for virtually all of the increase in denial rates, according to Kodiak’s analysis.

At the same time, hospitals, health systems and medical providers on the Kodiak platform recorded significant improvements on revenue cycle metrics related to cash flow. The average time to insurance payment, median days for claims in accounts receivable and median accounts receivable greater than 90 days all declined from 2024 to 2025, Kodiak data show.

“Payor behavior led to denial increases and a slight decline in the rate of overturning initial denials, with both driving the large overall increase in net revenue leakage from 2024 to 2025,” said Matt Szaflarski, Vice President, Revenue Cycle Intelligence for Kodiak. “The positive news on cash flow shows that revenue cycle teams can mitigate headwinds with strong performance on the things they can control.”

Kodiak’s data analysis comparing 2025 with 2024 also found:

“In comparing 2024 to 2025, we highlighted five revenue cycle trends, and four of them were negative for financial performance,” Szaflarski said. “In our work with the top performers on the Kodiak platform, however, we identified three best practices that revenue cycle leaders can focus on in 2026: practice tight accounts receivable discipline, focus limited denials resources on preventing clinical denials, and maintain rigor on front-end patient pay processes.”

More data from Kodiak’s “State of the healthcare revenue cycle” analysis and additional detail on these revenue cycle best practices can be found in the quarterly Kodiak RCA Benchmarking Analysis.

About Kodiak Solutions

Kodiak Solutions is a leading technology and tech-enabled services company that simplifies complex business problems for healthcare provider organizations. Over the past two decades, our team created and developed our proprietary net revenue reporting solution, Revenue Cycle Analytics. Kodiak also provides a broad suite of software and services in support of CFOs looking for solutions in financial reporting, reimbursement, revenue cycle, risk and compliance, and unclaimed property. Kodiak’s 450 employees engage with more than 2,300 hospitals and 375,000 practice-based physicians, across all 50 states, and serve as the unclaimed property outsourcing provider of choice for more than 2,000 companies. To learn more, visit Kodiak’s website.

Hospitals and health systems experienced higher denial rates from insurance companies when comparing 2025 with 2024, driving up revenue leakage by 25%.

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — An Australian air crew flew an American from an Antarctic base to a New Zealand hospital in a rare midwinter rescue.

The Airbus A319 Long Range aircraft, with the call sign Snowbird 1, flew from the Australian city of Hobart to the U.S. McMurdo Station in Antarctica on July 31 in response to an “urgent request for assistance,” the jet’s Melbourne-based owner Skytraders said in a statement Thursday.

The jet landed after a five hour and 30 minute flight at the Phoenix Airfield near McMurdo in darkness and with temperatures as low as minus 43 C (minus 45.4 F), the statement said.

The American was flown on the same day to a hospital in Christchurch, New Zealand, as weather conditions at the Antarctic air strip worsened, said Skytraders, which is contracted by the Australian Antarctic Division.

The U.S. National Science Foundation told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. that the patient was admitted to the Christchurch Hospital in a “serious condition.”

The AAD said in a statement Friday the patient continued to receive medical treatment in Christchurch.

“This was a complex operation carried out in the depths of the Antarctic winter, and it highlights both the capability of our people and the strong partnerships that underpin Antarctic programs around the world," the head of AAD, Emma Campbell, said.

New Zealand’s Health Ministry on Friday would not comment on the American’s condition or say whether the American remained in hospital.

The mission’s copilot, Louise Robertson, said conditions were close to the limit of the aircraft’s capabilities.

“We had some what’s called nautical twilight, which is a very minimal amount of light that is pretty much pitch blackness and also the extreme cold temperatures. We are right on the verge of the limitation of the aircraft,” Robertson told ABC.

“It was very close to being too cold,” she said. ”It got down to minus 43 (Celsius), which is the coldest I’ve ever felt. It was about 8 knots of wind, so quite a bit of wind-chill as well.”

Robertson said plans to fly to the base on the Ross Ice Shelf a day earlier were aborted due to a snow storm.

“There … was really just such a narrow window of opportunity,” Robertson said.

“To get there in complete darkness in these extreme cold temperatures is very, very rare. I believe it hasn’t been done before,” she added.

The sun last set at the geographic South Pole on March 23 and will not rise until Sept. 21.

The New Zealand Air Force evacuated a New Zealand citizen working on the U.S. Antarctic Program from the Phoenix Airfield in a C-130 Hercules in a medical emergency in April, which is the Southern Hemisphere autumn.

In August last year, the final month of the Southern Hemisphere winter, New Zealand used the same type of four-engine turboprop transport aircraft to evacuate three people on a flight from McMurdo for medical treatment.

McMurdo shares its airstrip with New Zealand's nearby Scott Base.

Graham-McLay reported from Wellington, New Zealand.

FILE - McMurdo Station, Antarctica, is photographed from the air on Oct. 27, 2014. (National Science Foundation via AP, File)

FILE - A sign is photographed at McMurdo Station, a United States Antarctic research station, on Dec. 4, 2018. (National Science Foundation via AP, File)