Beyond the Bundle: Navigating the 2027 Unbundling of Maternity Care

For decades, the "Global OB Bundle" has been the bedrock of maternity reimbursement. It was designed for a simpler time. An era of standardized 13-visit schedules and a "one-size-fits-all" approach to pregnancy.

As we've noted before, the gap in healthcare is rarely a lack of tools or tech. It's the change management required to keep pace with evidence-based care. Maternity care today is no longer a straightforward path from pregnancy to delivery. It's a complex, team-based journey that spans mental health screenings, social determinants of health (SDOH) interventions, remote monitoring, and extended postpartum support.

The American Medical Association (AMA) and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) recognized that traditional billing no longer reflects how maternity care is actually delivered today. In response, they restructured the CPT code framework from the ground up. This is known as the unbundling of the global OB code.

What is the OB Global Code and What is Unbundling?

Historically, providers used global CPT codes (like 59400 for vaginal delivery or 59510 for cesarean) to bill for the entirety of a patient's care: all prenatal visits, the delivery, and the standard six-week postpartum checkup. It was a single payment for a nine-month (plus) journey.

Unbundling is the decomposition of that single payment. Starting in early 2027, the traditional global codes are being retired. In their place, the industry is moving toward service-level, encounter-based billing. This means care will be reported and reimbursed in four distinct phases:

1. Antepartum Care: Transitioning from a flat fee to individual E/M (Evaluation and Management) codes for each visit.

2. Labor Management: A new set of codes to reflect the complexity and time spent during labor.

3. Delivery: Specific codes for the procedure itself.

4. Postpartum Care: Separate billing for the critical "fourth trimester" visits.

Why This Matters to the Entire Ecosystem

This isn’t just a billing change. It is a fundamental shift in how we value maternal health.

• For Providers: The global bundle often made personalized patient care - like managing high-risk complications or performing SDOH screenings - invisible and unreimbursed. Unbundling allows practices to be paid fairly for the actual complexity of the care they provide.

• For Payers: More granular data means better visibility into patient risk and provider performance. It creates the data foundation necessary for true value-based care and accurate risk adjustment.

• For Patients: When care is unbundled, invisible touchpoints become billable and, therefore, prioritized. This shift incentivizes a more tailored, high-touch experience that doesn't end abruptly after delivery.

How Wildflower Bridges the Gap

At Wildflower, we believe innovation shouldn't be a "thousand points of light" that never quite connect. The 2027 transition calls for a platform that captures what's happening between visits and makes that data usable. Wildflower’s solution is designed to be the digital compass and human-led support system that makes unbundling a clinical and financial success.

Our platform generates data across multiple touchpoints: screenings, referral completions, remote monitoring signals, and care navigation activity. This patient engagement starts early - 76% of women enroll in the first trimester - which means we're building the longitudinal record before the billing phases separate. Our Health Advocates maintain the human continuum this shift requires, delivering care navigation directly or coordinating with your internal teams. With 98% HRA completion rates, we're capturing the data that supports clinical complexity documentation, not just engagement metrics.

The Countdown is On: January 1, 2027

The official sunset of the global OB codes is scheduled for January 1, 2027. While that may feel distant, the transition period is already beginning. Many innovative payers and health systems are beginning to test these models as early as now, mid-2026, to ensure their workflows are ready.

As you begin your transition, here are three questions your team should be asking:

1. Do we have the data attribution to prove what we’re doing? If every visit and touchpoint is now a billable event, how are you capturing the work happening outside the traditional office visit?

2. Are our EHR and billing workflows ready for a 5x+ increase in claim volume? Moving from one global claim to a dozen or more individual claims per pregnancy requires significant operational lift.

3. How will we bridge the gaps? Unbundling risks creating a fragmented patient experience. Who is the connective tissue ensuring the patient doesn't get lost between these newly separated phases of care? How can this connection be maintained in postpartum?

Let’s continue the conversation. The transition to unbundled care doesn't have to be a burden; it can be the catalyst for a more sustainable, value-driven future for OBGYN care. Let’s plan that future together.

✅ Stay Tuned: This is the beginning of an informational series on the importance of and the needs for the unbundling of the global OB code.