Are insurers finally ready to ease preapproval requirements for medical care?
Business of Infertility
If there is one thing to bet on, then it is that medical insurance companies will not – ever – ease preapproval requirements for medical services, if they can help themselves! But facing increasing pressure from patients and doctors and, for the first time, the threat of regulatory crackdowns from federal as well as some local state governments, some media outlets, including The New York Times, recently claimed that some of the bigger insurance companies might indeed ease some requirements (1).
We are skeptical because we have heard these pronouncements too often before, with restrictions on care getting progressively worse than better, but a little bit of retained optimism cannot hurt, and who knows, maybe the Trump administration will finally get serious about medical insurance companies practicing medicine without a license.
And – because of pure ignorance – they sometimes do it even in self-destructive ways. Take, for example, the requirement by some insurance companies that most infertile women must have three intrauterine insemination cycles before being approved for trying IVF. How silly is that for an older woman, or even a younger woman who wants several children, or a younger woman with low functional ovarian reserve? It not only makes no sense from a clinical point of view, but even looking at this requirement as an expense consideration of the insurance company, it makes absolutely no sense.
Reference
Abelson R. The New York Times. June 20, 2025. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/20/health/health-insurance-prior-authorization.html