As we wrap up another year and get ready for 2026 to begin, it is once again time for everyone’s favorite annual tradition of Health IT Predictions! We reached out to our incredible Healthcare IT Today Community to get their insights on what will happen in the coming year, and boy, did they deliver. We, in fact, got so many responses to our prompt this year that we have had to narrow them down to just the best and most interesting. Check out the community’s predictions down below and be sure to follow along as we share more 2026 Health IT Predictions!
Check out our community’s Healthcare Technology predictions:
Jason Bobay, President & CEO at Recovery Force Health
Hospitals will get serious about preventable, dangerous, and costly hospital-acquired conditions. Driven by the overwhelming costs associated with preventable hospital-acquired conditions and emerging regulatory requirements, hospital administrators will move beyond existing, failing protocols and commit to significant investment in proven, data-driven med tech solutions.
For example, deep vein thrombosis (DVT) is the leading cause of preventable hospital death in the U.S, with up to 900,000 people affected. Mechanical prophylaxis, such as intermittent pneumatic compression (IPC) devices, is a widely accepted therapeutic method for preventing DVTs. However, these devices can pose significant barriers to mobility due to cumbersome tubes and cords that tether the patient to their bed. Compliance with mechanical prophylaxis is a challenge, with reported adherence as low as 40%. When prophylaxis adherence is low, risk goes up. Hospitals must turn to evidence-based DVT prevention devices that are comfortable, easy to apply, and easy to wear. Even more valuable, when those devices also track mobility data and give bedside caregivers visibility into patient activity and adherence.
Additionally, hospital-acquired pressure injuries cost the US healthcare system $12 billion annually, with individual treatment costs ranging from $20k to $152k. Approximately 1 in 10 hospitalized patients develop a pressure injury, which causes pain, increased infection risk, and increased risk of mortality. Effective pressure injury prevention tools and strategies exist; preventative care such as regular repositioning, optimal offloading of pressure points with immersion and envelopment, and utilization of heel suspension devices that elevate the heel and remove pressure and friction, help stop pressure injuries before they start. When hospital administrators invest in proven, effective, and comfortable pressure injury prevention devices, patients will adhere to them.
Expensive and dangerous hospital-acquired conditions cost billions annually and lead to longer stays, increased complications, and readmissions. Fortunately, preventive tools and devices exist to stop these conditions before they start. In 2026, hospitals will get serious about these evidence-based med tech solutions, leading to better outcomes and improved patient care.
Esther Chung, Reproductive Endocrinologist and Infertility Specialist (MD, FACOG) at HRC Fertility
AI and machine learning are making IVF more data-driven both clinically and in the embryology lab, with tools that aim to improve embryo grading and selection, better predict outcomes, and personalize treatment protocols for individual patients. While early results in the literature show promise, many of these technologies are still in limited clinical use and lack long-term validation. While there are concerns about cost-effectiveness and algorithmic bias, AI as a decision support and operational tool in IVF will continue to evolve and I look forward with optimism.
David Kirk, MD, Chief Medical Officer at Regard
In 2026, one of the more surprising and disruptive shifts in care will be the introduction of patient-side AI agents. As patients and families gain broader access to large language models and their medical records, intelligent tools will scan notes, labs, imaging reports, and bills for inconsistencies and opportunities. With this assistance, patients and families are going to be asking incredibly high-level questions like why care varied from the latest guidelines or why a surgical technique with better outcomes was not offered.
The traditional ‘just trust me’ posture will no longer suffice and will give way to increasing expectations that decisions will need to be explained and linked to evidence. The multiples of bureaucracy and inefficiencies this will add will be overwhelming to staff at times. To thrive in that world, clinicians will need AI at their side that helps them reason transparently, document their thinking, and practice in a way that can withstand constant, machine-assisted scrutiny.
Nupura Kolwalkar, Chief Product and Technology Officer at AdvancedMD
In the coming year, healthcare providers will likely see substantial advancements in the healthcare technology solutions they use to manage both patient care and administrative tasks. Artificial intelligence is making it possible to automate parts of key documentation workflows and business-critical administrative workflows so that providers have more time to focus on patient care. During the next 12 months, this trend will likely become standard across the ambulatory space as practice administrators integrate AI-powered tools further into their daily operations.
Specifically, ambient listening technology and agentic AI tools will be able to automate parts of a medical practice’s documentation, coding, and billing workflows. Not only will AI have an impact on operational workflows, if used effectively, it could also enable providers to deliver an improved patient experience. From earlier detection capabilities and dynamic care plans to digital support tools that increase patient engagement, the next wave in healthcare technology advancements could lead to fewer unnecessary treatments and higher patient satisfaction scores.
Essentially, in 2026, medical groups will have greater access to tools that may reduce inefficiencies across their practice, from claims processes and billing workflows to scheduling tasks and patient communications. The ambulatory care space may gain real-time insights as a result of AI use. This may help scale operations and fortify the financial health of the practice. Most importantly, AI may become healthcare’s backbone, augmenting human skills and enabling care that is efficient and effective.
Sharrón Manuel, Dr. at HRC Fertility
We’re seeing a convergence of technological, social, and economic trends that will push both embryo and oocyte cryopreservation to new highs. The number of healthy women opting for ‘social egg freezing’ to delay childbirth for career, financial, or personal reasons is growing rapidly. This technology allows women to stop constantly thinking about the biological clock and plan families on their own terms.
Ross Meyercord, CEO at Propel Software
AI and robotics reshape patient care. Robotic systems will increasingly enhance controls and positioning, while AI ensures precision, and AR lets surgeons pre-plan and overlay visualizations in real-time. This shift reduces surgery times, lightens staffing demands, and expands access into ambulatory service centers. At the same time, AI-powered software is improving treatment for chronic diseases and boosting drug effectiveness. 2026 is poised to be the breakout year when robotics, AI, and AR redefine surgical care.
Courtney Noah, VP of Scientific Affairs at BioIVT
The digital pathology space is growing rapidly. It has attracted significant investment and according to a study published in the Journal of Pathology Informatics, approximately 60% of pathologists currently utilize AI tools in their practice. Combining the benefits of digital pathology and AI is helping doctors to diagnose diseases more quickly and accurately.
Whole Slide Images (WSIs) are a critical component of digital pathology, providing a comprehensive view of tissue specimens to improve diagnostic accuracy. Unlike traditional glass slides, WSIs enable remote access, facilitate telepathology, and allow for advanced image analysis at scale. Incorporation of AI/ML algorithms into pathology workflows provides the ability to detect tumors and tumor subtypes, identify novel morphological structures, and perform quantitative biomarker analysis.
These algorithms can also assist in predicting patient outcomes and guiding personalized treatment plans, which is increasingly important in precision medicine. In fact, research studies have shown that some AI-based algorithms can provide a more precise and quantitative assessment of biomarker expression, beyond what’s accessible through traditional pathology.
Aaron Nye, Chief Operations Officer at Connect America
In 2026, we’ll see a fundamental shift in how tech-enabled care is delivered and supported across the healthcare ecosystem. Today, a large majority of Medicare reimbursement still flows through fee-for-service, including most value-based contracts, with only a small portion tied to population-based payment models. CMS’s new ACCESS Model will accelerate the move toward payment frameworks that reward measurable improvements in patient health, transforming value-based care into an actionable reality. This shift will advance the integration of remote monitoring, smart connected devices, and continuous home-based support into everyday care workflows. Health plans and providers that embrace this approach will reach high-risk populations earlier, intervene more effectively, and deliver meaningful improvements in both outcomes and experience. 2026 will mark the era of scalable, tech-enabled, patient-centered care.
Antoine Pivron, Vice President at Withings Health Solutions
The majority of clinicians are flying blind between clinic visits, but wearables can surface the micro-patterns in subtle sleep disruption, activity drops, or stress spikes that can predict a patient’s risk for a health issue before it becomes a clinical event. This isn’t about overwhelming clinicians with raw data; it’s about giving them distilled, evidence-based insights that help them intervene earlier and keep patients on track to improve outcomes. The next frontier in cardiometabolic care is continuous risk detection, with risk scores embedded directly into everyday devices.
Looking ahead, wearables and connected health tools will quietly synthesize signals from heart rate variability to sleep patterns to metabolic biomarkers, generating real-time probabilities and calculating risk scores for conditions like heart failure, hypertension, or diabetes long before symptoms appear. We’re moving toward a world where cardiometabolic risk isn’t assessed annually in a clinic, but continuously in the background of daily life.
Rick Robinson, VP of Product Innovation at The AgeTech Collaborative from AARP
Smart home technology will move from convenience into lifesaving infrastructure, a front-line safety system. This is a big leap since the Life Alert days. AI environments, using sensors and machine learning, can now detect behavior changes, flag disparities, and highlight safety risks, which will play a major role in preventing accidents and enabling longer independence for older adults and improved peace of mind for caregivers. In 2026, smart homes will essentially act as a continuous health monitor, providing a safety net for those aging at home.
Christoffer Rosenblad, CEO at XVIVO
The traditional method of transporting donated organs in what are essentially beer coolers limits the amount of time organs are viable, making organ transplantation a high-pressure race against the clock. Technologies, such as machine perfusion, allow organs to stay viable for longer outside the body, giving transplant teams additional time to make informed assessments and increased flexibility to operate on a more deliberate schedule. As hospitals integrate these technologies, organ transplantation will shift to a planned and predictable medical procedure. This shift will improve safety, reduce physician burnout, and enhance care for both patients and medical staff.
Kunal Sarda, CEO at Arya
In 2026, the EMR in post-acute and home care keeps unbundling because providers are flat-out done being trapped inside clunky, monolithic systems that can’t keep up with value-based care, AI, or modern operations. Surveys show roughly 60 percent of healthcare leaders are now prioritizing modernization of core platforms like EHRs and ERPs, with a decisive tilt toward cloud-native architectures to escape the financial and operational drag of legacy tech. At the same time, the EHR market itself is shifting toward web and cloud deployments, driven by regulatory pressure for quality reporting and value-based care, and by vendors racing to embed AI and automation. Yet post-acute and hospice providers still lag hospitals in EMR maturity and often rely on multiple disconnected systems, creating data silos and manual workarounds that make advanced analytics and risk management almost impossible.
The result is growing provider pressure to ‘pull functions out of the EMR’ – staffing, intake, scheduling, patient engagement, analytics – into specialized, cloud-based tools stitched together by modern integration platforms and data layers that can actually scale and stay secure. In that world, the EMR becomes just one service in a broader modular stack rather than the center of the universe, and any vendor insisting on being the one system that ‘does everything’ starts to look less like a partner and more like technical debt.
Pete Stetson, Chief Medical Information Officer at TigerConnect
Hospital smart rooms will deliver significantly more value in 2026 as they evolve into active clinical processors that reduce noise, improve safety, and return hours of clinicians’ time. Hospital rooms generate a tremendous amount of communication with the care team today. Unfortunately, a lot of that is ‘noise’ (nuisance alerts) and non-urgent requests that distract providers from patients who need them. Without an orchestration layer, this noise flows directly to clinicians, creating avoidable interruptions and increasing cognitive load.
With smart rooms functioning as intelligent intermediaries, automated triage will route nonclinical requests to the right service teams, reduce alarm fatigue, and escalate only the events that require medical attention. Integrating environmental controls, communication pathways, patient engagement, and AI-driven interpretation of in-room data will allow hospitals to turn a patient’s environment into a coordinated participant in care delivery. Hospitals will see faster room turnover, fewer delayed discharges, improvements in safety metrics, and reduced nurse workload, while providing a more empowered patient experience.
Mohammad Waqas, CTO for Healthcare at Armis
As healthcare environments continue to adapt and innovate, the image of what a ‘medical device’ looks like is also changing. Hospitals are continuing to adopt smart technology and power more digital patient experiences, which in turn expands the security landscape to include more than just what meets the eye. However, the broader definition of technology in healthcare often ignores essential assets like security cameras, digital signage, patient check-in kiosks, HVAC systems, or pharmacy management systems. Limiting the focus of cybersecurity to only a select few of these devices only adds to the lack of visibility and protection in healthcare.
In 2026, the term ‘medical device security’ may start to feel outdated, and organizations that can show they are serious about protecting every asset will build trust and lead the way in this new era of healthcare.
Thank you so much to everyone who took the time out of their day to submit a prediction to us, and thank you to all of you for taking the time to read this article! We could not do this without all of your support. What do you think will happen for Healthcare Technology in 2026? Let us know on social media. We’d love to hear from all of you!
Be sure to check out all of Healthcare IT Today’s Healthcare Technology content and our other 2026 Health IT Predictions.
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