Delaware moved first. The Delaware Department of Health and Social Services and the Delaware Health Care Commission announced a Rural Health Transformation Program initiative that will support real-time insurance verification and prior authorization across the state — connecting clinicians, payers, health systems, and patients through the Delaware Health Information Network (DHIN), the state’s health information exchange, and the Smart Health Network.
Together, DHIN and Smart Health Network will support more efficient exchange of the administrative information that today consumes clinician and staff time — insurance eligibility, prior authorization, and the transactions that follow — through a shared connection point that lets participating providers and payers connect once, using common standards, instead of maintaining numerous individual connections.
“As a physician, I have watched prior authorization consume time that belongs to patients. The promise here is simple: cut the paperwork, not the care. A neutral hub that every payer and provider can join once — and that patients can actually see into — is the change the front lines have been waiting for.”
— Dr. Neil Hockstein, Chair, Delaware Health Care Commission
“Delaware already trusts DHIN to move health information securely across the state. The Smart Health Network extends that trusted, neutral foundation to the administrative transactions that sit alongside care. We are building on what Delaware already has to support patients, clinicians, and payers.”
— Dr. Jan Lee, CEO, Delaware Health Information Network
“Delaware decided to treat this like the public infrastructure it is — neutral, and designed around patient interest. The hub connects everyone through a single integration. Delaware is first, but the network is built for every state.”
— Paul Meyer, CEO, Smart Health Network
The work continues
The July Connectathon brought organizations together to test with synthetic data. The program is now preparing the first Delaware prior-authorization workflows for January 2027 and sharing lessons other markets can reuse.
Read the implementation update, join a readiness discussion or start a synthetic test with your team. July recap →
The Delaware initiative is supported by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) as part of a financial assistance award totaling $157,394,963.86, 100 percent funded by CMS/HHS. The contents of the state’s announcement are those of its authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of, nor an endorsement by, CMS/HHS or the U.S. Government.
About Smart Health Network — updated description
Smart Health Network is a neutral health data network built to cut paperwork, not care. It connects the systems plans, providers and partners already use, making connection work reusable and progress easier for people to follow. Prior authorization is first, with Delaware leading a shared implementation effort. Press: press@smarthealthnetwork.org