What Is CAQH? A Guide for Healthcare Providers
If you are a healthcare provider applying to accept insurance, you have almost certainly encountered CAQH. The acronym stands for the Council for Affordable Quality Healthcare, a nonprofit alliance of health plans and trade associations that maintains a universal provider database used across the United States.
What Is CAQH ProView?
CAQH ProView is the organization's flagship credentialing platform. It lets providers enter their professional information once — licenses, education, malpractice history, work history, DEA registration, and more — and then share that data electronically with every health plan that requests it. More than 1.4 million providers use ProView, and over 900 health plans and hospitals rely on it to verify credentials before granting network participation.
Why Do Payers Require CAQH?
Before CAQH existed, each insurance company maintained its own paper application. Providers had to fill out dozens of nearly identical forms, mail supporting documents, and follow up manually with every payer. CAQH eliminates that duplication. When a payer pulls your ProView profile, they receive a standardized, verified data set that satisfies their credentialing committee requirements. Most commercial payers — including Aetna, Cigna, UnitedHealthcare, and many Blue Cross Blue Shield plans — now mandate an active CAQH profile as a prerequisite for enrollment.
How to Set Up Your CAQH Profile
Getting started with CAQH ProView involves several steps:
- Obtain a CAQH Provider ID. Some payers assign one automatically when you begin an application. You can also self-register at the CAQH ProView website using your NPI number.
- Complete the application. The profile asks for personal demographics, education and training, board certifications, state licenses, DEA numbers, malpractice insurance details, work history, hospital affiliations, and disclosure questions.
- Upload supporting documents. You will need digital copies of your medical license, DEA certificate, board certification, malpractice face sheet, CV, and government- issued ID.
- Authorize health plans.In the "Plan Authorization" section, select every payer you want to credential with. If a payer is not authorized, they cannot view your data.
- Attest and submit. Electronically sign the attestation, confirming that the information is accurate and complete.
Keeping Your CAQH Profile Current
CAQH requires providers to re-attest every 120 days. If you miss the deadline, your profile status changes to "Inactive," and payers can no longer access your data — which can stall pending credentialing applications or even trigger a termination from existing networks. Set calendar reminders or use an automated monitoring tool to ensure you never lapse.
You should also update your profile immediately whenever something changes: a new license, a practice address move, updated malpractice coverage, or an additional specialty certification. Outdated information is one of the top reasons credentialing applications are returned for corrections, adding weeks of unnecessary delay.
How Creds Clinic Integrates with CAQH
Creds Clinic pulls your existing CAQH ProView data automatically during the credentialing process. Instead of re-entering the same information across payer portals, our platform reads your CAQH profile, cross-references it with NPPES, OIG, and other federal databases, and pre-fills payer applications on your behalf. If your CAQH profile is missing data or approaching its re-attestation window, Creds Clinic flags the issue before it causes a delay. The result is a faster, more reliable credentialing workflow that keeps your CAQH data and payer enrollments in sync.