Primary source: Kodiak Solutions via Business Wire, November 4, 2026. The report is the Kodiak Platform Benchmarking Analysis, Q4, titled “The revenue cycle performance plateau.”
The 2,400 hospitals and 375,000 physicians on the Kodiak Platform lost $52.1 billion of net revenue to bad-debt and final-denial write-offs in 2025, up 17.6% from 2024. The rate did not move. Leakage is still around 10% of net revenue, where it has sat since 2023. The $132.2 billion in the headlines is Kodiak's extrapolation to 6,100 U.S. hospitals. Label it that way. It is not an audited industry total.
Kodiak's measured 2025 write-off, up 17.6% from 2024. The $132.2 billion figure extends that result to 6,100 U.S. hospitals. Use $52.1 billion as the platform number. Use $132.2 billion only as Kodiak's extrapolation.
Kodiak's release is November 4, 2026. Healthcare Dive covered it November 9, in a story by Jacqueline LaPointe. AccountsRecovery.net covered it November 6. The report in this cycle is the Kodiak Platform Benchmarking Analysis, Q4, titled “The revenue cycle performance plateau.”
| Figure | What it is |
|---|---|
| $52.1 billion | Net revenue the 2,400 hospitals and 375,000 physicians on the Kodiak Platform lost to bad-debt and final-denial write-offs in 2025, up 17.6% from 2024. This is the platform figure. |
| $132.2 billion | Kodiak's extrapolation of “net revenue leakage” to 6,100 U.S. hospitals in 2025, from proprietary platform data. Kodiak's estimate. Not an audited industry total. |
| Around 10% of net revenue | Leakage in 2025, flat with 2024, about 10% through October 2026, and stuck around 10% since 2023. The release headline uses 10%. |
| AccountsRecovery's 2025 reading | A combined 10.5%. That is AccountsRecovery's reading of the report, not a second Kodiak total. Its series, as a share of net revenue: bad debt 7.5% / 7.0% / 7.4% / 6.9% and final denials 2.8% / 2.9% / 3.1% / 2.9% for 2023, 2024, 2025, and through October 2026. |
| Healthcare Dive's rounding | Bad debt has hovered around 7% of net revenue and final denials around 3% over three years. That rounding is Healthcare Dive's. |
| March 31, 2026 | An earlier Kodiak release: more than $48 billion of leakage for 2,300 platform hospitals, up 25%. Different sample, different method. Not this $52.1 billion, and not the $132.2 billion extrapolation. |
$132.2 billion is the figure people will quote. It is Kodiak extending platform write-offs to 6,100 hospitals. It is not a summed, audited loss for every U.S. hospital, and it does not belong on a trend line with the March 31 release.
The plateau in the title is a rate. About 10% of net revenue in 2025, the same as 2024, about 10% through October 2026, and around 10% since 2023. Healthcare Dive, covering the same report, says bad debt has hovered around 7% of net revenue and final denials around 3% over three years. AccountsRecovery prints the year-by-year shares in the table, and its combined 2025 figure is 10.5%. The release headline says 10%. Two readings of one rate. Neither one turns the extrapolation into an audit.
Healthcare Dive's account of why the dollars rose on a flat rate is high-dollar denials, case-mix shifts, and rising total hospital revenue. The same story says providers may not be “adequately distinguishing between technology needed to operate the revenue cycle and the capabilities needed to optimize their financial performance.” That sentence is Healthcare Dive's.
“Revenue cycle leaders must view information technology, including AI, as no more than table stakes for improving financial performance.” — Matt Szaflarski, vice president of revenue cycle intelligence at Kodiak. AccountsRecovery's November 6 article uses the “no more than table stakes for improving financial performance” clause and attributes it to him.
The report, as covered, sets three outside figures beside that flat rate. Definitive Healthcare: average hospital IT operating expense from $9.1 million in 2022 to $10.5 million in 2024. Forrester: provider technology budgets from $64 billion in 2025 to $69 billion in 2026. Bain and KLAS: revenue cycle management is the top health IT investment priority for acute care. Those are citations inside the Kodiak report. They are not a RevCycleAI recount of hospital IT spend, and they are not the $52.1 billion or the $132.2 billion.
This is not an audit, and it does not promote Kodiak's extrapolation into an industry total. No hospital-level write-off, no payer, and no named AI product result is added here, because none was disclosed as such.
What was measured: bad-debt and final-denial write-offs on one platform were $52.1 billion in 2025, up 17.6% in dollars, while leakage stayed around 10% of net revenue. The $132.2 billion is what you get by stretching that platform result across 6,100 hospitals. A revenue-cycle leader can use the rate, which has sat near 10% since 2023, without treating the national dollar figure as if someone had audited it.
Healthcare Dive's point is the one to take into a staff meeting. Dollars can rise on a flat rate when the denials are larger, the case mix shifts, and the revenue base itself is bigger. A 17.6% increase in platform write-off dollars is not, on these sources, a 17.6% increase in the leakage rate. If your board deck quotes the dollar growth and skips the rate, it is answering the wrong question.
The conclusion traveling with the report is that information technology, including AI, is table stakes, and that the missing piece is the capability to change financial performance. Kodiak sells revenue-cycle analytics. That conclusion lines up with the product. The alignment does not make the $52.1 billion false. It does mean the measurement and the recommendation come from the same company. Use the rate. Weigh the recommendation against the product it points back to.
Quote $52.1 billion as the platform write-off. Quote $132.2 billion only as Kodiak's extrapolation. The rate has been stuck around 10% of net revenue since 2023. The dollar total for all 6,100 hospitals was not audited. On Kodiak's own telling, technology, including AI, is table stakes, and the rate is what has not moved.
The useful work is keeping the figures in their lanes. Five distinctions, then you can put the benchmark down.
The plateau is the rate, not the headline dollar. On Kodiak's platform, bad debt and final denials took $52.1 billion of net revenue in 2025, up 17.6% in dollars, while leakage stayed around 10% of net revenue, where it has been since 2023. The $132.2 billion is Kodiak's extrapolation of that result to 6,100 U.S. hospitals. It is not an audited industry total.
AccountsRecovery's 10.5% combined 2025 rate is that outlet's reading. Healthcare Dive's around-7% and around-3% figures are that outlet's rounding over three years, and its explanation for rising dollars is high-dollar denials, case mix, and a larger revenue base. The March 31 release, more than $48 billion on 2,300 platform hospitals, is an earlier measurement with a different sample. The advice that technology, including AI, is table stakes comes from a company that sells revenue-cycle analytics, and it matches the product. Keep the extrapolation labeled as Kodiak's.
Denial benchmarks, with the extrapolation left in the publisher's own words.
Sources: AccountsRecovery.net, November 6, 2026: $132.2 billion described as an estimate extrapolated from the platform to 6,100 hospitals; $52.1 billion on 2,400 hospitals and 375,000 physicians, up 17.6% from 2024; bad debt 7.5% / 7.0% / 7.4% / 6.9% and final denials 2.8% / 2.9% / 3.1% / 2.9% for 2023, 2024, 2025, and through October 2026; combined 2025 reading 10.5%; Definitive Healthcare $9.1 million to $10.5 million; Forrester $64 billion to $69 billion; Bain and KLAS on RCM as the top acute-care health IT priority; Szaflarski's “no more than table stakes” clause. Healthcare Dive, Jacqueline LaPointe, November 9, 2026 returned 403 on direct fetch. The Dive-attributed points are used as supplied: bad debt around 7% and final denials around 3% over three years; dollars rising on a flat rate because of high-dollar denials, case-mix shifts, and rising total hospital revenue; and the line that providers may not be adequately distinguishing technology needed to operate the revenue cycle from capabilities needed to optimize financial performance. Kodiak via Business Wire, November 4, 2026 also returned 403. The release facts are used as supplied: platform loss of $52.1 billion, up 17.6%; the $132.2 billion extrapolation to 6,100 hospitals as net revenue leakage, not an audited industry total; leakage about 10% of net revenue in 2025, flat with 2024, about 10% through October 2026, stagnant around 10% since 2023; the Q4 report title “The revenue cycle performance plateau”; and Szaflarski's sentence that revenue cycle leaders must view information technology, including AI, as no more than table stakes for improving financial performance. The March 31, 2026 Kodiak release, more than $48 billion of leakage for 2,300 platform hospitals, up 25%, is a separate earlier measurement and is not this sample. Kodiak sells revenue-cycle analytics. The RevCycleAI analysis section is our read of the benchmark.