Infinitus vs Cohere Health PAS: 3-Way Guide 2026

The category decision is whether you are buying provider-side prior-auth chase or a payer FHIR PAS API. Infinitus vs Cohere Health for Da Vinci PAS is that two-product comparison. They are not interchangeable UM logos.

Physicians citing burnout: 53% according to AMA (2024), AMA 2024 Physician Burnout Survey. Documentation and prior-auth chase are a stated reason firms look at automation; this page does not claim either vendor reduces burnout by 53%.

Prior Authorization API due: 1 Jan 2027 according to CMS (2024), while 72-hour expedited and 7-calendar-day standard decision timeframes generally began January 1, 2026. Cohere Connect is a standalone FHIR PAS offering that does not require Cohere UM, as described on Cohere Connect (2026). Da Vinci CRD, DTR, and PAS is the chain CMS encourages.

This page is published from the homepage. No vendor paid for inclusion.

TL;DR: Choose Infinitus when you are a provider organization that still has to chase status across payers that are not API-complete. Choose Cohere Health (including Connect) when you are a payer (or a provider connecting to a payer) that needs a FHIR Prior Authorization API. Keep the EHR as the clinical system of record. Orchestrate only when PAS, the EHR, and the patient message still disagree after a named clinician hold.

Two products, one PAS chain

CRD asks whether prior auth is required. DTR asks which documents. PAS carries the request and response. Infinitus historically wins the “still on the phone” gap. Cohere wins the “we must expose a FHIR API by 2027” gap. Buying Infinitus as if it were your payer’s CMS-0057-F API is a category error. Buying Cohere Connect as if it replaced every payer phone tree on day one is also a category error.

SLA: 72 hours / 7 days according to CMS (2024). Those clocks already run. The API date is the later one.

Da Vinci PAS chain: 3 IGs according to HL7 Da Vinci (2026). If a vendor cannot name CRD, DTR, and PAS, they are selling a portal.

Adjacent reading: healthcare automation benchmarks, patient follow-up, appointment preparation, and claims inquiry calls.

Key Takeaways

• Infinitus is provider chase; Cohere Connect is a FHIR PAS offering.

• SLAs started 1 Jan 2026; APIs are due 1 Jan 2027.

• Connect does not require Cohere UM, per Cohere’s public FAQ-style materials.

• Burnout (53%) is context for documentation load, not a vendor KPI.

• Orchestrate member-visible denials; do not auto-post them.

Evaluation weights

Weights assume a 2026 buyer who is either a provider drowning in phone PA or a payer on the CMS-0057-F clock. Do not average those two buyers into one score without picking a side.

Normalized feature matrix

Scores from public pages checked 2026-09-06. USTA column is first-party design numbers (1 hold, 1 recipe, 8 gates).

Infinitus wins chase. Cohere wins PAS API, including a Connect path that is described as usable without Cohere UM. In our own corpus, 48.6% of pages once earned zero impressions for 12 months — an unread PAS log is the same failure mode.

Pricing (checked 2026-09-06)

Both quote. Example: 1 specialty group, 4 PA coordinators, 40 packets/week, or 1 payer building a PAS API.

Ask for PAS IG version, CRD/DTR, SLA clocks, denial-reason fields, and EHR write-back in one quote. A cheaper chase bot that cannot emit FHIR is not a 2027 API.

Infinitus vs Cohere profiles

Infinitus — best for provider-side chase

Infinitus is used to automate prior-auth and benefits status collection, including voice paths, while payers catch up to APIs. Best fit: provider ops whose payers still answer the phone. Limitations: contact vendor; not a substitute for an impacted payer’s Prior Authorization API; confirm Da Vinci PAS if they claim it. Implementation: payer census, EHR work queue, then a hold when a PAS endpoint exists. Primary evidence: Infinitus public pages. Disqualifier: you are the payer who must expose PAS by 2027.

Cohere Health — best for FHIR PAS, including Connect

Cohere Health is a UM and PAS vendor. Cohere Connect is positioned as a standalone FHIR PAS offering that does not require Cohere UM. Best fit: payers (and partners) who need CMS-0057-F Prior Authorization API mechanics. Limitations: contact vendor; implementation is a FHIR project; drugs are generally out of CMS-0057-F PA API provisions. Implementation: CRD, DTR, PAS, SLA clocks, Patient Access prior-auth data. Primary evidence: Cohere Connect pages and CMS fact sheet. Disqualifier: you only needed someone to sit on hold with a payer.

Keep the EHR portal — best when PAS already writes back

If the EHR already submits PAS and displays decisions with a clinician review, adding a second chase brain is how you duplicate authorizations. Best fit: one PA ID, one clock, one chart. Limitations: native automations stop at the EHR wall. Disqualifier: coordinators still live in a shared voicemail.

Cross-system PAS holds

When Infinitus (or the EHR) shows “approved” but Patient Access still lacks the prior-auth record, a proposed US Tech Automations path could match the authorization ID, pause for a clinician, and only then post member-visible status. Prerequisites: PAS or chase export, unique claim ID, Patient Access, and a human who will catch a missing denial reason. Configurable capability, not a live health-system result. The agentic workflow path is the allowlisted route for that hold.

A second proposed path: a FHIR Claim.use of preauthorization waits for ClaimResponse.outcome, then opens a clinician hold before any denial letter. Output: hold queue, claim ID, SLA remaining, and a yes/no. Same rules: no implied deployment.

Zapier plus Make plus n8n can connect a FHIR subscription to tickets and Slack and can keep run histories, retries, error branches, and audit evidence when configured. The operator still owns observability, idempotency, escalation, access controls, retention, and PHI. A proposed US Tech Automations design would require the clinician hold before any member-visible denial and write the decision back to the chart.

Worked packet: 40 packets, 53%, 72 hours

A specialty group submitting 40 prior-auth packets a week in a market where 53% of physicians report burnout, with a 72-hour expedited clock, can treat FHIR Claim.use = preauthorization as the object that must receive a ClaimResponse before anyone texts the patient. The 40, 53%, and 72 figures are a worked scenario; Claim.use is a real FHIR R4 element. If Cohere Connect is the payer API, keep PAS there. If Infinitus is chasing non-API payers, keep chase there. Dual-writing “approved” in a spreadsheet and “pended” in the EHR is how you schedule a procedure you cannot bill.

Who this is for

This comparison is for provider PA leads and payer interoperability leads who must live with CMS-0057-F clocks. Stack: EHR plus chase or PAS plus UM. Pain: phones vs APIs, burnout vs documentation.

Red flags: a cash-pay clinic with no PA; a payer whose Connect or core PAS already meets 2027 IGs with a clinical review; a buyer who will not sign a BAA.

Payer census vs API readiness

Split the book of business before you buy. List the top payers by PA volume. Tag each as PAS-ready, 278-only, portal, or phone. If 30 of 40 weekly packets still require a phone tree, Infinitus (or equivalent chase) is the 2026 buy and Cohere Connect is the 2027 payer-side bet — possibly at different organizations. If you are the payer, the census is your provider-facing SLA risk: 72 hours expedited is already on.

Do not average a provider score and a payer score into one “winner.” That is how comparison pages become fiction. The feature matrix above is evidence of two jobs. The weights table makes you pick a column.

Member-visible status is a clinical letter, not a Slack emoji. Patient Access must carry prior-auth information (excluding drugs) by January 1, 2027. Posting “denied” without a specific reason fails the 2026 operational rule. The proposed hold sits on that reason field. If your PAS already blocks empty reasons, you do not need a third system to nag it.

MIPS electronic prior-auth attestation in 2027 will make providers ask which of your APIs they used. If the answer is “none,” they will exclude. That is a relationship problem as well as a rule problem.

Drugs remain out. Specialty PA is not solved by this pair.

Write the PA ID once. Infinitus chase, EHR, and PAS must share it. If chase creates a second ID, you will tell the patient “approved” on a different authorization than the one the payer posted. That is how a procedure gets scheduled against a denial.

Provider-side buyers should list the share of packets that still require phone. If it is most of them, Connect does not replace Infinitus this year. Payer-side buyers should list whether Connect is standalone PAS or bundled UM on the actual order form. Public FAQ language is not the contract.

Keep a gold-path packet: one expedited, one standard, one denial with reason, one “more information.” Time them. If 72 hours and 7 days are not visible on the packet, you cannot operate the SLA. Software that hides the clock is not CMS-0057-F ready even if it speaks FHIR.

Do not text the patient from the chase bot. Member-visible language is a clinical and legal artifact. The hold exists because 53% burnout does not authorize a coordinator to send a denial from a personal phone.

Benefits eligibility is not PAS. Infinitus may chase both in the field; this page scores prior-auth PAS. If your RFP mixes eligibility, PA, and claims status into one “voice AI” line, you will buy the wrong SKU. Split the RFP: eligibility, PA chase, PAS API.

Payer implementers should staff IG versions as a living list: PAS STU 2.0.1, CRD STU 2.0.1, DTR STU 2.0.0 in the fact sheet’s recommended set, plus the required FHIR R4.0.1 / US Core floor. A vendor who cannot name versions is not ready for a 2027 API audit.

QHP issuers on FFEs are called out as excepted from the 72-hour / 7-day SLA in the fact sheet. If you are that issuer, do not copy a Medicaid SLA dashboard blindly. Copy the provisions that apply to you.

Federal Register cite: 89 FR 8758 according to the Federal Register (2024). Counsel will want that number; ops will want the fact-sheet dates.

MIPS e-prior-auth year: 2027 on the same CMS fact sheet already linked for API dates — attestation, not a numerator. Keep Infinitus chase and Cohere PAS on that calendar, not on a vendor slide.

Infinitus public site: 2026 according to Infinitus (2026). Confirm whether a given SKU is chase, PAS, or both before you score it as a payer API.

Decision checklist

1. Name your side: payer API vs provider chase.

2. List CRD, DTR, PAS in the contract if you are the payer.

3. Census how many of your top payers still require phone.

4. Pilot 12 packets: API payer vs phone payer.

5. Never auto-send member-visible denials.

6. Add a hold only if EHR and PAS disagree.

Frequently asked questions

Is Infinitus or Cohere better for Da Vinci PAS?

Cohere (including Connect) is the better default for a payer FHIR PAS API. Infinitus is the better default for provider chase while payers are incomplete. Do not average the scores.

Does Cohere Connect require Cohere UM?

Cohere’s public Connect materials describe Connect as a standalone FHIR PAS offering that does not require Cohere UM. Confirm that on the contract you sign.

When should we skip a workflow layer?

Skip US Tech Automations when Infinitus or Cohere already writes decisions to the EHR with a clinician review, when you will not connect FHIR, or when no clinician will own member-visible denials. Zapier plus Make plus n8n are enough if your team will own logs, retries, access control, and PHI.

Do these rules cover drugs?

CMS-0057-F PA API and SLA provisions generally exclude drugs. Keep a separate drug PA path.

What started in 2026 vs 2027?

SLAs and denial reasons generally began January 1, 2026. The Prior Authorization API and the other FHIR APIs are due beginning January 1, 2027. Metrics: March 31, 2026.

How should we test a denial?

Test a PAS denial with a specific reason, a clinician hold, and no patient text until the hold clears. If the vendor cannot show the reason field, do not go live.

Pick chase or PAS, then the hold

Pick Infinitus for provider chase or Cohere Connect for payer PAS. Put IG versions and SLA clocks in the quote. Pilot 12 packets. If you still need a clinician hold between ClaimResponse and the patient, review plan options.