Automation is the top planned cost-cutting move for 2026, named by 36.0% of practice leaders in MGMA's January 27, 2026 Stat poll of 226 respondents. Process fixes came second at 23.0%, and hiring freezes or staff cuts came third at 18.0%.
Most leaders chose something other than a headcount cut. The poll offered five options, and 82.0% of respondents picked one that keeps current staff in place.
Which cost-cutting moves do practice leaders rank first?
MGMA asked practice leaders for their single biggest planned cost-cutting move for 2026. The poll drew 226 applicable responses. Chris Harrop of MGMA published the results on January 28, 2026. The same page lists related MGMA polls, including one in which 71.0% of groups reported some AI use in patient visits in 2025.
| Planned move | Share of 226 leaders |
|---|---|
| Automation | 36.0% |
| Process fixes | 23.0% |
| Hiring freeze or cuts | 18.0% |
| Outsourcing | 14.0% |
| New vendors | 9.0% |
Source: MGMA Stat poll, January 27, 2026, 226 applicable responses.
The January article also notes that more than nine in ten practices reported higher operating costs in both 2024 and 2025. Pay rates and supply prices are set outside the practice. Task volume and cost per task are the levers a practice controls itself.
Automation and process fixes together account for 59.0% of answers. Outsourcing and vendor changes add another 23.0%. A freeze or cut was the choice of fewer than one leader in five.
How much are costs rising at medical groups?
In MGMA's June 23, 2026 poll of 251 medical groups, 84.0% said year-to-date operating costs were higher than at the same point in 2025. Another 8.0% reported about the same costs and 8.0% reported a decrease. Among groups with higher costs, the average increase was about 11.0%, and most answers fell between 5.0% and 20.0%.
The share with higher costs has eased from earlier years. MGMA Stat recorded 95.0% in 2023, 92.0% in 2024 and 90.0% in a June 10, 2025 poll. Even so, more than eight in ten groups still report an increase.
Labor drives much of it. In a July 8, 2025 MGMA Stat poll, 65.0% of practice leaders named labor as the area with the biggest percentage cost increase. MGMA's 2026 DataDive Management and Staff Compensation data shows median total compensation for medical receptionists, medical assistants and LPNs rising 15.0% to 22.0% over five years.
MGMA also reports that operating cost per full-time physician rose more than 63.0% from 2013 to 2022. The Medicare conversion factor rose 1.7% over the same period.
What did groups with flat costs do differently?
Only 16.0% of the 251 groups in the June 2026 poll reported flat or lower costs (8.0% flat, 8.0% lower). MGMA asked these groups what held costs down. They named tight budgeting, not backfilling open roles, limiting new hires and consolidating offices. They also named process optimization and selective use of AI, automation or outside vendors, along with lower supply costs.
Pay plans show how little room there is in the labor line. In MGMA's September 2025 budgeting poll, 64.0% of leaders planned base-pay increases of 1.0% to 3.0% for 2026. Another 23.0% planned increases of 4.0% to 6.0%. Together, 87.0% of leaders planned a raise of at least 1.0%, so pay lines will grow in most budgets.
A freeze on pay or hiring saves money only if work volume holds steady. Groups that cut headcount without changing the work shift that load to the staff who remain.
Where do process fixes start? EHR workarounds
A July 21, 2026 MGMA Stat poll of 216 medical groups asked how often staff rely on workarounds in the EHR and practice management system. MGMA has not published a dollar cost for them. A workaround is any extra step staff take because the system does not do the job directly, such as re-keying data or tracking referrals on a side spreadsheet.
| Use of EHR and PM workarounds | Share of 216 groups |
|---|---|
| Frequently | 43.0% |
| Sometimes | 32.0% |
| Rarely needed | 16.0% |
| Never | 3.0% |
| Unsure | 6.0% |
Source: MGMA Stat poll, July 21, 2026, 216 applicable responses (published July 23, 2026).
Together, 75.0% of groups use workarounds frequently or sometimes. MGMA says they show up most in documentation, clinical intake, order entry, prescribing, referrals, prior authorization and lab workflows. Medical assistants often absorb the extra work, which hides the staffing cost of the system gap. Even groups that rarely need workarounds named outages, log-in steps, file uploads and data checks as occasional sources of extra work.
MGMA's January 15, 2025 poll found 30.0% of leaders ranked EHR usability as their top technology priority. AI tools drew 32.0%.
Does automation reduce staff workload?
The data is split. In MGMA's August 5, 2025 Stat poll of 244 practice leaders, 71.0% reported some use of AI in patient visits and 29.0% reported none. Among the groups that use it, 44.0% said it had not reduced workload, 39.0% said it had, and 17.0% were unsure.
MGMA found that practices using AI in 26.0% or more of visits were more likely to report a gain. The page gives no exact percentage for that comparison. The poll did not report how many hours the groups saved.
A practice that picks automation as its main cost move can set a baseline first. Count staff hours per task before the tool goes live, then count again after 90 days. Without a baseline, a group cannot tell which side of the split it sits on. In the August 2025 poll, 17.0% of AI-using groups could not say whether their workload had changed.
Sources
- MGMA Stat, Automation, process fixes top list of cost-cutting moves for medical practices in 2026, January 28, 2026
- MGMA Stat, Operating costs keep climbing for medical practices in 2026, June 24, 2026
- MGMA Stat, EHR and PM workarounds reveal the hidden cost of broken workflows, July 23, 2026
- MGMA Stat, Most practices use some form of AI, but is it actually reducing staff workloads?, August 6, 2025
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