Your financial prep guide for MGMA Annual Conference 2027
MGMA has not yet published dates or a host city for the 2027 Annual Conference; the 2026 edition ran September 27-30 in San Antonio. MGMA publishes the benchmarks that define outpatient practice performance, which makes this the flagship event to plan around. Sorso is not an exhibitor, sponsor, or speaker at this event. This is an independent prep guide for practice managers and clinic owners.
The CFO read
If you went to MGMA 2026 and implemented changes based on what you learned, bring your results. If you did not implement anything, that is the question worth sitting with: why not? The data is only valuable if it drives action. MGMA 2027 is your chance to recalibrate, but only if you actually measured the gap since last year.
— Stanislav Sukhinin, CFA · Founder, Sorso
What this event is
MGMA — the Medical Group Management Association — is the professional body for the people who run medical practices. Its flagship event, now called the Annual Conference and long known as the Leaders Conference, is the largest gathering it holds, drawing administrators, executives, and owners across specialties.
The program spans the full range of practice management: benchmarking through MGMA's DataDive datasets, payer contracting, staffing and operations, and the financial metrics that define outpatient performance. It is broader than the single-topic Focus conferences and carries the largest exhibit hall.
For an outpatient clinic owner deciding which MGMA event to attend, this is the one with the widest agenda and the most benchmarking content. The prep checklist below applies whenever the 2027 dates land.
Why this matters for your bottom line
MGMA releases updated benchmarking data at the annual conference. Practices that use this data to set operational targets tend to outperform peers on revenue per provider and margin.
Staffing ratios drift over time. The clinics that right-sized their staffing based on MGMA data often see margin improvements within a couple of quarters.
Payer reimbursement continues to tighten. MGMA data gives you the evidence base to renegotiate contracts rather than simply accepting rate decreases.
Operational benchmarks compound: practices that consistently benchmark and improve tend to widen the gap over peers who do not measure.
What to look for
Updated MGMA DataDive benchmarks for your specialty and practice size
Staffing optimization case studies with before-and-after financial data
Payer contract negotiation success stories that used benchmark data as evidence
Technology ROI case studies specific to practices under $20M in revenue
Patient experience initiatives that have measurable financial impact
Financial prep checklist
Review these before you go.
Walk through last year's MGMA benchmark comparison and what has shifted since
Run year-over-year changes in overhead, revenue per provider, and margin
Audit staffing ratios against MGMA medians for your specialty
Inventory operational changes made since the last MGMA and what each moved in dollars
Map your payer contract performance against MGMA reimbursement benchmarks
Set a target for each of your top 3 operational priorities for the next 12 months
What it costs to send someone
Registration is the line everyone budgets first. It is rarely the one that decides whether the trip was worth it.
Registration
MGMA has not announced a 2027 date, city, or price. The edition it has published is September 27-30, 2026 in San Antonio, which is the only anchor available for a 2027 budget line. Treat any 2027 figure you see quoted elsewhere as invented.
Coverage and lost production
Administrators do not bill, so the direct revenue cost of sending yours is close to nothing. The real cost is that for the length of the conference plus travel, nobody is running the practice. Payroll questions, escalations, and vendor decisions queue up and land the day they get back. For MGMA the question is not what it costs, it is who is acting administrator while they are gone.
Who else travels
Owners who go with their administrator get more out of it, because the decisions the sessions provoke need both of you anyway. That is a second registration and a second set of travel, against a stretch where the practice has neither of its decision-makers on site.
What comes back as a deduction
IRS Publication 463 allows the travel deduction for a convention where “your attendance benefits your trade or business,” on the ordinary rules for travel away from home. Meals are generally limited to 50% of the unreimbursed cost. Keep the agenda with the receipts, and confirm the treatment with whoever signs your return.
No rates are quoted here. The organizer had published none when we last checked this page against their site on 10 August 2026, and travel is yours to price for your own dates anyway. The point of the list is that the two lines owners leave out, coverage and headcount, are the ones that decide the real number.
Before MGMA Annual Conference 2027, get your own numbers straight
Walk in able to check every benchmark on the slides against your own numbers. Three ways owners start with us:
Fractional CFO
Strategic CFO for $3M–$50M clinics
Forecasts, location-level P&L, and exit prep. Starts at $4,000/mo.
Explore Fractional CFO →Accounting
Healthcare-specialist accounting
Books done right by people who understand clinic finance. Starts at $2,000/mo.
Explore Accounting →Free Assessment
A financial checkup before you go
Four minutes. See where your practice stands so every session is measured against your own numbers.
Take the assessment →Going to MGMA Annual Conference 2027?
Tell us, and we will look at coming to meet you.
Stan does not have a ticket booked for this one yet. If enough clinic owners want to sit down there, that is what decides it. Register interest and we will confirm either way well before the dates — no obligation, and we will not add you to a mailing list.
Register interest in meeting →
Founder of Sorso and a CFA charterholder. Before Sorso, Stan spent 19 years in corporate finance at institutions including UniCredit and Société Générale — managing a $450M loan portfolio and making senior partner at a major mezzanine lender by 29 — then built a fractional CFO firm exclusively for outpatient healthcare clinics.