In a move aimed at saving money and tossing old technology to the trash heap, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said it is swapping out faxing and snail mailing for streamlined electronic transactions, putting an end to fax machines in nursing homes.

“The 1980s called, and they want their fax machines back,” said CMS Administrator Mehmet Oz (Dr. Oz). “The futuristic medical breakthroughs we’ve achieved, like augmented reality glasses that give surgeons X-ray vision, shouldn’t have to coexist with administrative systems that often lag decades behind. This new rule will modernize American healthcare by standardizing electronic claims attachments and enabling secure electronic signatures. Because every minute providers save on paperwork is another minute they can spend caring for patients.”

Innovator Sees Opportunity

Ben Zimmer, the CEO and co-founder of AI workforce management innovator Veras (veras.com), said the action by CMS to render fax machines extinct is more than a policy change.

"The CMS move away from fax machines in skilled nursing is long overdue — and it's a signal, not just a policy change,” he said. “SNFs have operated on legacy communication infrastructure for decades, and fax is really just the most visible symptom of a deeper reluctance to modernize.”

Zimmer added that when CMS sets a hard line like this, it creates the forcing function that operators need to invest in real solutions.

“The facilities that embrace this shift — digital messaging, structured data exchange, modern care coordination platforms — are going to see better outcomes and better staff experience. The ones that treat it as a compliance checkbox will just find the next analog workaround,” he said.

“The opportunity here is to use this moment to reimagine how SNFs communicate internally and with the broader care ecosystem, not just to swap one outdated tool for another."

Fax Jokes No Longer

For Mordy Eisenberg, co-founder, chief growth and product officer, TapestryHealth, he said in skilled nursing, “we used to joke that when we upgraded from an analog fax machine to a digital fax, we had finally arrived in the modern age. That joke stopped being funny a long time ago.”

He said as a healthcare executive and a healthcare consumer, “I can say few things are more frustrating than watching one of the most important industries in America still rely on fax machines to move critical information. It is slow, inefficient, error-prone, and completely out of step with the rest of modern life. Patients can bank, shop, and communicate instantly from their phones, yet healthcare still too often depends on technology that belongs in a museum.”

Fax the Gold Standard?

Ironically, Eisenberg said that faxing is still treated “as if it is somehow the gold standard for security. In reality, much of it is now just digital, computer-to-computer communication masquerading as innovation.”

Even worse, fax workflows generate massive amounts of unstructured data that cannot be easily accessed, searched, or integrated by other systems, which only creates more barriers to interoperability and more delays in care.

Without judging what lies ahead, Eisenberg noted that the SNF sector has heard the “end to the fax machine” talk on previous occasions.

“Seema Verma said in 2020 that it should be the last year of the fax machine in healthcare. That clearly did not happen. Hopefully CMS means it this time, because the fax machine is not a symbol of reliability; it is a symbol of how stubbornly healthcare resists needed change. This relic is long overdue to be retired,” he added.

Millions on Millions in Savings

Beyond technology, CMS said the Administrative Simplification, Adoption of Standards for Health Care Claims Attachments Transactions and Electronic Signatures Final Rule is projected to save the healthcare industry roughly $781 million annually by establishing national standards for the electronic exchange of clinical documentation used to support healthcare claims.

The rule also adopts standards for electronic signatures to ensure secure, authenticated transmission of this information.

The standards adopted in this rule apply to HIPAA-covered entities, including health plans, healthcare clearinghouses, and healthcare providers that conduct electronic transactions.

The rule is effective on May 26, 2026, 60 days after publication in the Federal Register. Covered entities must comply by May 26, 2028, which is 24 months of the effective date.

See the final rule here.

Comments or questions? Contact Patrick Connole at pconnole@parkplacelive.com.