American Medical Assoc.: Insurers file 1 in 5 claims inaccurately

One in five medical claims is processed inaccurately by commercial health insurers, often leaving physicians shortchanged, according to the nation's largest doctor's group.

The American Medical Association released its third annual report card on insurers Monday.

In past years, Medicare performed well in how quickly and accurately it paid doctors, but the AMA did not release Medicare's data Monday to keep the focus on commercial insurers. Those private insurance companies matched their payments to what they agreed to pay doctors about 80% of the time.

The AMA report card is an effort to reduce the cost of claims processing for doctors. As much as $210 billion is spent annually just to process insurance claims.