Bill Siwicki

Unlike claims or EHR data, diagnostics reveal what's occurring biologically in real time – often before symptoms emerge. Especially when combined with AI, it can support smarter treatment decisions, one CEO says.

Virtual care must be the VA's next great innovation, says Kent Dicks, CEO of Life365, who says telehealth should scale to meet the agency's needs and bring better care to veterans.

Lacey Jensen, RN, the health system's director of informatics education, previews a HIMSS26 session where she'll focus on the blended learning approach with computer adaptive tools to enhance efficiency and boost knowledge.

At HIMSS26, Dr. Nathan Moore of the BJC Accountable Care Organization will show how health systems can move beyond chatbots toward safely deploying AI that takes action in complex workflows – pulling data, triaging patients and nudging clinicians.

At Annapolis Internal Medicine, patient satisfaction ratings jumped, labor capacity more than doubled without adding staff, and hold times dropped from four minutes to under one minute, all because of the agentic AI technology.

Beth Meese, the health system's executive director of IT, digital health and enterprise EMR, offers a preview of her HIMSS26 session, which will offer an up-close perspective on how to make ambient tools work to "meaningfully reduce" clinician burden.

And that was just in the first six months. By catching needed radiology follow-ups and ensuring patients receive recommended follow-up care, the Virginia health system helps prevent more advanced disease and supports value-based care initiatives, one exec says.

The practice reduced inefficiencies and eliminated dependence on costly third-party call services. Further, the tech reclaimed 20,000 staff hours in those two months – time now used for direct patient support.

In 2026, healthcare will embrace the model context protocol, deploy better documentation tools that boost reimbursement and patient outcomes, and adopt smaller, domain-specific AI models, one CEO says.

The achievement was made by uncovering and activating capacity that had always been there: Staff just couldn't see it until they implemented consistent processes and system-wide analytics.