Four Key Credentialing Trends Every Healthcare Leader Should Know
By: Jacob Byrlen, COO Radiant Healthcare
The stakes for credentialing have never been higher. Far from a back-office obligation, it now determines how quickly patients gain access to care, how reliably organizations meet compliance standards, and how efficiently hospitals run.
The workforce outlook makes the point clear: the United States is projected to face a shortage of up to 86,000 physicians by 2036. Every day lost to credentialing delays stops clinicians from providing healthcare at a time when they have never been needed more.
Four key trends will shape how hospitals and staffing agencies approach credentialing over the next few years.
Let’s take a look at each.
Trend 1: Clinician shortages intensify the pressure
The impact of physician shortages is felt directly in unstaffed beds, deferred procedures, and longer patient waits. This shortfall lands hardest in primary care and non-metro regions where access challenges are already severe.
What makes this trend more urgent is that demand is rising at the same time supply is shrinking. Retirements are accelerating, fewer graduates are entering certain specialties, and younger clinicians are increasingly drawn to locum or part-time work that offers more flexibility.
Staffing firms and hospitals cannot afford to let credentialing drag on for months in this environment, because every delay translates into fewer available providers.
The solution is discipline. Credentialing milestones must be treated as fixed deadlines with clear accountability, not as optional paperwork. Each step should have an owner, and progress needs to be tracked. It’s also important to build staffing forecasts on real credentialing timelines and not on best-case assumptions that rarely materialize.
Trend 2: Payer scrutiny and regulatory complexity keep rising
Credentialing is under more scrutiny than ever. Payers now examine every line of an application, from malpractice records to work histories, and even small mistakes can result in reimbursement delays or outright denials.
Regulators are also tightening their grip. CMS continues to broaden its risk-based screening, most recently adding skilled nursing facilities to the list of providers subject to fingerprinting, site inspections, and higher levels of review.
In January 2026, The Joint Commission will introduce new standards that require automated audit trails, traceable peer review documentation, and enhanced compliance checks. These changes will push credentialing teams to adopt systems capable of real-time verification and transparent reporting.
Trend 3: Technology-enabled credentialing is becoming standard practice
Automation now allows core credentialing tasks such as primary source verification, license status checks, and exclusion screening to run continuously rather than occasionally.
This has already saved the notoriously wasteful healthcare industry billions of dollars, with billions more in savings still possible as organizations move away from manual or semi-digital processes.
In credentialing, automation translates directly into fewer errors and faster turnaround. When core processes can run in the background, staff are free to focus on oversight, compliance, and problem-solving.
Trend 4: Portability is accelerating through licensure compacts and verifiable credentials
Portability is also emerging as a real accelerator in credentialing. The Interstate Medical Licensure Compact now spans some 42 member jurisdictions, creating a faster route to multi-state practice and cutting down the duplication of paperwork.
For hospitals that build telehealth networks or rely on traveling clinicians, this increases the speed with which providers can be deployed. At the same time, digital credential wallets and verifiable credential systems are moving from concept to pilot.
Blockchain-based platforms enable clinicians to carry a secure, portable record of verified qualifications between employers. While not yet universal, these innovations are gaining momentum and hint at a future where providers spend much less time re-entering the same information.
Best practices for staying ahead
The following practices can help organizations tighten operations, reduce risk, and ensure clinicians are cleared to deliver care more quickly:
Align HR, compliance, medical staff, and finance around one shared timeline so credentialing, privileging, and enrollment move together.
Break the workflow into steps and measure how long each takes, how often they pass cleanly, and where mistakes force rework. Using data, teams then determine where automation can remove bottlenecks and where human oversight remains essential.
Take advantage of portability tools like the Interstate Medical Licensure Compact (IMLC) and validated digital records when policy allows.
Define KPIs leadership cares about, such as cycle time, denial rates, and continuous monitoring coverage.
Build playbooks for high-risk provider categories so teams know exactly what’s required before audits.
The bottom line
Credentialing has outgrown its reputation as just a back-office paperwork. Workforce shortages, tighter oversight, and automation have now made it a strategic function with direct impact on access, compliance, and financial performance.
Organizations that adapt quickly will benefit first. Faster credentialing reduces compliance risk and moves clinicians into practice sooner. What’s more, it helps close staffing gaps with more predictability and gives leaders firmer ground for planning.
The advantage grows stronger when processes, data, and technology are aligned. Leaders who make those investments not only reduce regulatory risk but also build organizations that can staff more predictably and compete more effectively for both patients and clinicians.
References
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/article-abstract/2752664
https://www.aamc.org/news/press-releases/new-aamc-report-shows-continuing-projected-physician-shortage
https://www.newswire.com/news/hospitals-face-credentialing-technology-overhaul-as-2026-compliance-22568675
