What healthcare technology trends will play out in 2025?
Wolters Kluwer Health has released a new '25 for '25 predictions report that identifies technology trends to watch out for in 2025.
According to the group, health care is undergoing unprecedented transformation. Headlines about artificial intelligence technology for the health sector have shifted away from grandiose promises as the dust starts to settle around the potential of Generative AI.
Here, Stacey Caywood, CEO of Wolters Kluwer, takes a strategic look at the following top three areas where healthcare AI will be having substantive influence in 2025:
1. AI for healthcare workflows
In 2024, we saw the healthtech sector really start to focus 2023’s AI excitement into tangible solutions that make clinicians’ workdays easier and more productive. For example, transformative tech like a GenAI ambient listening scribe dramatically reduces administrative burdens. In 2025, look for more synergies and partnerships emerging between AI and complementary technologies that serve as a force multiplier for the potential of AI to drive efficiency in the clinical workflow, provide relief from burnout, and deliver value for health systems.
[Read more: The future of AI in pharmacy]
2. AI for clinician workforce development
Amid staffing shortages, 2025 will see AI helping future clinicians get on a fast track to practice-readiness. Nursing education tools are being wholly rethought to leverage the capabilities of AI. For example, AI has the potential to boost nurses’ licensure prep so students learn from mistakes with smarter, more personalized reinforcement. Look for AI chatbots to transform virtual reality training by providing lifelike conversations with virtual patients. AI will also accelerate the development and adoption of clinical practice changes as hospital nursing leaders turn to AI to power the often-cumbersome process of updating nursing practice protocols.
3. AI for patient safety
AI healthtech is largely focused on helping clinicians. I’d expect to see that scope broaden with AI playing a bigger part in patient safety. In 2025, look for AI solutions that go deeper into live health data to identify disconnects in care that are often overlooked and can impact patient safety. Imagine an AI “helper app” that works 24/7 in the background to identify instances where healthcare providers may miss a potential test or therapy for a patient or – worse – illicitly divert medications from patients, potentially doing harm. Stopping drug diversion with AI is just one example of AI scaling system-wide to comprehensively improve patient safety.
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To read all 25 predictions authored by Wolters Kluwer Health experts, download the complete, eight-page 25 for ’25 predictions report here.