Governor Signs Legislation to Streamline Critical Healthcare Access

October 7, 2025

SACRAMENTO, CA — California has moved closer to streamlining access to medically necessary care for patients with the Governor’s approval of SB 306, the Defending Physicians Decisions Act, authored by Senator Josh Becker (D‑Menlo Park).
“I am grateful to the Governor for signing my Physicians Make Decisions Act and helping patients get medically necessary care faster. Doctors should be spending their time with patients and not drowning in paperwork for treatments that nearly always get approved anyway,” said Senator Becker. “We are the only industrialized nation in the world that doesn’t allow physicians to make the final call on routine treatments. SB 306 cuts red tape so patients get the care they need, when they need it.”
SB 306 targets the growing bottleneck caused by prior authorization requirements on procedures, tests, and treatments that health plans approve at least 90 percent of the time but still demand extra review. According to a 2023 American Medical Association survey, physicians spend an average of 12 hours per week on these authorizations with:

19 percent reporting a patient hospitalization due to delays.
13 percent reporting life‑threatening events caused by delayed care.

Under SB 306, any service or treatment that is approved at least 90 percent of the time based on data collected, the Department of Managed Health Care will place that service or treatment on a list to be exempted from prior authorization. The bill excludes experimental treatments and situations of fraud. This data‑driven reform will reduce delays, ease administrative burdens on providers, and allow insurers to focus on more complex cases.
“This is a smart, data‑driven solution,” Becker added. “If insurers approve a service almost every time, there’s no reason to slow down patient care with extra red tape.”
SB 306 is sponsored by the California Medical Association is supported by a large coalition of healthcare advocates.