NAACOS 2026: How Health Systems Use Data and AI to Manage Regulations and Reduce Operational Burden

Regulations continue to evolve across CMS programs. CMS keeps revising models, introducing new programs, and shifting performance benchmarks. Care teams are expected to adapt to these changes without affecting daily operations. For most ACOs and health systems, that pressure continuously increases across organizations. NAACOS 2026 provides a timely opportunity to focus on practical strategies that are improving quality scores and cost performance.

This year, the focus is on practical implementation. Health system leaders are not looking for more theory. They want tools that fit into existing workflows, reliable data, and AI that reduces administrative burden. This shift is reflected in this year’s conference discussions.

The Regulatory Pressure Isn’t Slowing Down

New CMS models often introduce documentation changes, reporting requirements, and updated performance metrics. Many health systems still respond to these changes reactively instead of anticipating them, which affects operational efficiency, cost, and quality outcomes.

Where the Operational Burden Is Coming From

The operational strain goes beyond administrative work:

• Staff time shifts from patient care to compliance and documentation tasks
• Risk often goes undocumented without real-time identification systems
• Network leakage often goes unnoticed until it impacts shared savings
• Care gaps remain open when teams lack a unified and current patient view

Health systems are addressing these gaps using stronger data infrastructure and AI integrated into care workflows.

What’s Working on the Ground at the NAACOS Spring Conference

The NAACOS Spring Conference focuses on ACO leaders and practitioners, and 2026 continues that direction. Persivia is joining the conference at the Hilton Baltimore Inner Harbor, April 22–24, sharing examples of how data and AI support ACO financial performance.

The Featured Breakfast Panel

On Thursday, April 23, 7:30–8:15 AM, Persivia is hosting an interactive breakfast panel titled “What’s Working on the Ground: How Health Systems Use Data & AI Today.” 

This session covers:

• Using real-time data to improve value-based care performance
• Navigating regulatory change without increasing administrative load
• Reducing operational burden through tools integrated into clinical workflows
• Improving quality scores and managing cost performance

The session focuses on practical insights from healthcare leaders. It brings together practitioners sharing proven approaches.

From Fragmented Data to Trusted Intelligence

Most ACOs manage large volumes of data, including claims, clinical records, lab results, and referral patterns, but this data is often fragmented across systems. When data is siloed, care teams cannot act on it in time.

Closing Care Gaps and Reducing Network Leakage

Persivia’s patented platform transforms that fragmented data into a unified, longitudinal patient record, giving ACOs clear visibility across every care setting. That visibility directly addresses two of the most expensive problems in value-based care:

Network leakage, where patients are seen outside the network without follow-up, erodes shared savings. Catching it requires real-time referral tracking and alerts, not a report three weeks later.

Unaddressed care gaps in preventive and chronic care impact quality scores and patient outcomes. Closing them requires identifying them in real time, not at the end of the performance period.

Here is how a data-driven approach addresses common ACO challenges in practice:

Challenge	Solution
Out-of-network visits going unmanaged	Real-time referral tracking and alerts
Missed post-discharge follow-ups	Automated outreach triggered by claims
Undocumented chronic conditions	AI-driven HCC gap identification
Fragmented patient records	Longitudinal record across all care settings

The Five Capabilities Driving ACO Performance

Platform effectiveness varies based on capability, integration, and real-time usability. What separates tools that move outcomes from tools that sit unused comes down to five things:

• AI-Augmented Population Health Management: Real-time guidance that supports care decisions beyond static dashboards.
• Workflow-Embedded Clinical Intelligence: Decision support delivered at the point of care.
• Longitudinal Patient Understanding: An integrated patient record that supports quality and cost performance.
• Quality and Financial Performance Optimization: Predictive insights aligned with value-based care models.
• Operational Efficiency for Care Teams: Reduced documentation workload and improved care team productivity.

Conclusion

At NAACOS 2026, high-performing ACOs are not just responding to regulatory change. They are using data and AI to proactively manage performance. Embedded clinical intelligence, real-time understanding, and single-patient records are now being implemented. These approaches are currently being used across health systems.

Experience It Firsthand at NAACOS 2026

Persivia offers an AI-first population health platform purpose-built for ACOs and health systems, supported by a population health cloud and an AI engine delivering real-time clinical intelligence. If you’re attending the NAACOS Spring Conference, this is an opportunity to understand how data-driven insights support financial and clinical performance.

 

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