The R&D tax credit applies to practices that develop novel clinical protocols, custom surgical techniques, and proprietary diagnostic methodology. Not just pharma companies and research institutions. Private practices qualify right now.
Engineering-trained specialists. Sector-specific documentation. Covering general practice, dental and oral surgery, orthopedic and sports medicine, and reproductive technology.
Most practices that qualify do not think of their daily work as research. But if your team is developing better treatment approaches, figuring out the right technique for a clinical challenge, or testing new protocols because existing ones are not sufficient, there is a strong chance that work qualifies right now.
The R&D tax credit does not require inventing something new to the world. If the approach is new to your practice and required genuine experimentation to develop, it qualifies. A surgeon refining a technique for a specific anatomical challenge, a fertility clinic optimizing a stimulation protocol, or a dental practice engineering a custom implant approach can all qualify even if similar work exists elsewhere. The uncertainty is about whether it works for you, not whether anyone has ever done it.
The work must aim to develop or improve the functionality, performance, reliability, or quality of a process, technique, formula, or system. A medical practice meets this through developing better treatment protocols, more effective surgical approaches, or more accurate diagnostic methods. The improvement does not need to be successfully deployed. Failed experiments count.
An orthopedic group develops a modified joint reconstruction protocol for patients whose anatomy does not accommodate standard implants. The goal is to improve functional outcomes through a new technique. The first two approaches fail. All three attempts qualify because the intent was to improve the technique's performance.
This prong is met by any practice developing a better way to treat a clinical challenge. The purpose is improving how the technique, protocol, or tool functions, not serving any single patient.
The work must rely on principles of biology, chemistry, engineering, or other physical or life sciences. Medical practice R&D is grounded in clinical science, physiology, pharmacology, and biomedical engineering. Business judgment, patient preference decisions, and administrative process changes do not satisfy this prong. Technical clinical judgment does.
A fertility clinic develops a novel ovarian stimulation protocol for poor responders, drawing on endocrinology, pharmacology, and reproductive biology. The protocol adjusts medication sequences and dosing based on measured hormonal response. The biological science foundation is clear and unambiguous.
Clinical science, surgical biomechanics, diagnostic technology, and biomedical engineering all satisfy this prong. The threshold is low for most medical practice development work because the science is inherent to clinical practice.
There must be genuine technical uncertainty about whether the approach will work, not just uncertainty about how an individual patient will respond. This is the most scrutinized prong in medical practice claims. The IRS examiner will ask: was there real uncertainty about the capability, method, or design of the technique itself, beyond the normal exercise of clinical judgment applied to a known approach?
An oral surgeon developing a novel bone grafting sequence for complex implant cases faces genuine uncertainty: will this material combination and surgical sequence achieve sufficient bone integration in compromised anatomy? The uncertainty is about the technique's capability, not just the patient's healing. That distinction matters to the IRS.
Uncertainty about an established technique applied to a new patient is adaptation. Uncertainty about whether a novel approach will achieve the required clinical result is qualified research. The line between them is where most medical practice claims succeed or fail.
The work must involve evaluating alternatives to resolve the identified uncertainty. This is the documentation prong. Clinical intuition and physician experience alone do not satisfy it. The evaluation process must be traceable: what alternatives were considered, how they were compared, and what outcomes were measured. This is the prong that aecre builds the entire documentation structure around in medical practice studies.
A multi-specialty practice developing a proprietary outcomes measurement system tests three data collection methodologies against each other, documents which metrics each approach can and cannot capture, and selects the final design based on measured performance. The evaluation is systematic and traceable. Physicians describe it naturally in clinical terms. aecre builds the proof-of-experimentation documentation around those descriptions.
The most common failure in medical practice claims: physicians conduct genuine experimentation but document it in clinical language rather than POE language. The interview methodology aecre uses bridges that gap without asking physicians to change how they work.
For the full four-part test explanation, see the main R&D Tax Credit page.
The qualifying activities above apply across general medical practice. The following specialties have distinct activity profiles and key exclusions. Select your specialty type.
An orthopedic surgery group in the Northeast began seeing a pattern: patients presenting with anatomy that did not accommodate commercially available knee implants. Standard placement protocols produced poor alignment or insufficient fixation. Two surgeons spent 18 months developing a modified placement protocol, documenting the technical uncertainty at the outset, evaluating three alternative fixation geometries, and tracking functional outcomes across a defined patient cohort.
The documentation grew naturally from their existing clinical process. Protocol notes, outcome measurement records, and declarations signed under penalty of perjury formed the contemporaneous proof of experimentation. The surgeons never thought of the work as research. They were solving a clinical problem systematically. That is exactly what the R&D credit rewards.
A multi-specialty primary care group in the Midwest needed to track specific outcome metrics to evaluate intervention effectiveness across patient cohorts. Their commercial EHR could not do it. Their clinical director, a data analyst, and a nurse practitioner spent 14 months building a proprietary measurement system that fed back into protocol decisions across three specialties.
The work was entirely practice-funded, built for internal use, and involved genuine technical uncertainty about whether the methodology would produce statistically reliable and clinically useful results. All three staff members worked directly on the development. Their wages, allocated to development hours, represent the primary qualifying research expense. Standard EHR licensing fees and routine data entry do not qualify.
An oral and maxillofacial surgery practice in the Southeast treating complex implant patients with significant bone loss developed a novel sequencing and material approach for bone grafting. The practice documented the clinical uncertainty at case intake, tested alternative material combinations and surgical sequences across a defined patient cohort, and built a comparative outcomes log tracking healing response and implant integration rates over 12 months.
The approach went beyond manufacturer protocols. The surgeons retained substantial rights to the methodology and funded the development entirely from practice resources. When aecre conducted the technical interview, the surgeons described the development in clinical terms. The documentation team built the proof-of-experimentation structure around those descriptions without asking the physicians to reframe their work.
Answer the quick check questions to see if your practice qualifies.
Most medical practices are pass-through entities. Nearly 40 states stack additional credits on top. The federal number is the floor.
The feasibility conversation takes 30 minutes. We assess your qualifying activities, estimate credit value, and tell you plainly whether a study makes sense for your practice. No commitment, no cost.
Book a Free AssessmentWe respond within one business day. Partner-led from first conversation through filing.