Healthcare organizations have spent years investing in digital tools, connected systems and increasingly sophisticated data capabilities. But owning leading-edge medical technology and realizing its full value are two different things; often, valuable features go underused, information remains disconnected or tools aren’t fully integrated into everyday work.
For many healthcare systems, the next meaningful technology improvement may come from making better use of what’s already there rather than adding another tool. Below, members of Forbes Technology Council discuss where healthcare organizations may be overlooking near-term value in their existing tech stacks and what leaders can do differently to leverage those resources for stronger clinical, operational and business results.
Turning Connected Data Into Action
Healthcare has made progress connecting data and systems, but the bigger opportunity is turning that intelligence into action. Leaders should focus on action interoperability: enabling people, AI and systems to work together across end-to-end workflows with the governance and accountability required to deliver measurable outcomes. – Sundar Subramanian, Zyter
Expanding Access With Virtual Care
Many healthcare organizations underuse existing technology like telehealth to boost clinical and financial outcomes, missing a chance to expand community access. Leaders shouldn’t overhaul clinician workflows; instead, they should optimize them through hybrid staffing models that pair in-house clinicians with academically trained virtual care clinicians, building sustainable programs across neurology, infectious disease, intensive care, cardiology and maternal-fetal medicine. – Raj Narula, Sevaro
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Making Prescribing Alerts More Patient-Specific
Many healthcare organizations already have decision-support alerting built into their prescribing systems, which could be made more context-aware for individual patients. Leaders may consider repurposing these existing tools around the patient data that already exists to help ensure the guidance clinicians receive feels timely and relevant rather than generic. – Venkatesh Sankaran, Saguna Consulting Services LLC
Unlocking Unstructured Medical Data With Agentic AI
Structured data tells you what happened: age, lab results, dosage. Unstructured data tells you why and what it means: doctor’s notes, prescription context, patient narratives. That context is where decisioning lives. Agentic AI systems are capable of extracting meaning from unstructured data at scale. But healthcare organizations haven’t connected that capability to the data they already possess. They’re chasing new platforms instead of mining existing assets. – Nasreen Dawood, Deloitte
Refilling Canceled Appointment Slots
Leaders should start with the appointment slots that nobody refills. A cancellation at 9 a.m. on Tuesday is capacity and revenue that has gone by Wednesday, even though the scheduling system ships with waitlist backfill that was never switched on. The waitlist itself is on a piece of paper at one desk. Ask what you already pay for and have never configured before you buy anything new. – Dimitar Dimitrov, Accedia
Turning Patient Data Into Actionable Risk Queues
Turn existing electronic health record, lab and claims data into a risk queue, not another dashboard. Start with one high-burden condition, such as chronic kidney disease; identify people overdue for screening or follow-up; and connect each case to accessible point-of-care testing and a named care-team owner. Track completed screenings and interventions, not alerts. Closed loops show whether technology changed care. – Boris Berat, Carna Health
Connecting Sensitive Data Across Systems Securely
Healthcare organizations are leaving value on the table by keeping sensitive data siloed. Leaders need to evaluate how existing infrastructure can support confidential computing, which securely connects data across systems. The priority should be building a trusted data foundation that lets AI deliver more actionable insights without compromising privacy. – John Pettit, Promevo
Connecting AI Agents To Existing Workflows
Focus on Model Context Protocol. By enabling data integration via MCP using proprietary systems and insisting that all third parties be MCP-enabled, healthcare organizations can unlock the value of LLMs for a cross-functional set of employees. Those employees can then use tools like Claude Code or apps like Slack to engage agents across a variety of tasks, including data collection and insights, troubleshooting, and job-specific automation. – Adam Farren, Canvas Medical
Engaging Technology Partners More Strategically
Healthcare organizations leave value on the table when they engage vendors only around individual products. Leaders should bring trusted technology partners into strategic conversations, sharing the broader challenges they need to solve and mapping complementary capabilities to enterprise outcomes. The goal is not one system for everything, but the right ecosystem working together. – Heather Bassett, Xsolis
Training Clinicians With AI Patient Simulations
Healthcare teams leave value untapped by not using AI agents as simulated patients. Unlike human actors, AI agents can retain long‑term memory, track emotional patterns and surface consequences consistently. Leaders should use them to train clinicians in judgment and communication before real patients absorb the risk. – Terry Oroszi, Wright State University
Integrating Patient Care Handoffs
Healthcare organizations are leaving value on the table in the handoffs between systems referrals, intake forms, authorizations and discharge information, which often still move via fax, paper or manual re-entry. Leaders should first connect the tools they already own, capture information as structured data, and measure time returned to clinicians. Better integration may create more value than another platform purchase would. – Ajit Sahu, Data SafeGuard Inc.
Leveraging Existing Data For Drive Real-Time Operations Management
The value being left on the table is operational: bed turnover, discharge timing, staffing matched to demand. Leaders should stop buying more reporting tools and start deploying ones that act on the data they already have. Healthcare organizations already have the systems (electronic health records; admission, discharge and transfer feeds; and so on), but the data is sitting in reports and dashboards instead of driving real-time decisions. – Mudit Garg, Qventus
Using Compliance Data To Guide Drug Development
In drug development, immediate value is often hiding in data organizations already collect but don’t fully leverage. In targeted radionuclide therapy, for example, imaging and dosimetry data collected for safety and regulatory purposes can also inform patient response and dose decisions. Leaders should look beyond collecting data for compliance and ask how it can improve the next development decision. – Mirjam Trame, Certara
Streamlining Administrative Tasks Through Patient Portal Features
Too many health systems treat patient portals as a simple digital filing cabinet rather than an operational tool. By failing to configure built-in features like self-service scheduling, digital intake and triage, organizations keep their phones flooded with routine administrative tasks. Real progress happens when leaders stop viewing portals as passive communication channels and actively integrate them to streamline front-desk workflows. – Neil Lampton, TIAG
Turning EHR Data Into Automated Care Triggers
Most health systems already own electronic health record and analytics platforms capable of real-time risk stratification, but the data sits passive. Leaders should wire those existing systems into automated clinical workflows so records become active signals, triggering outreach, care coordination and earlier intervention rather than waiting for a clinician to manually pull a report. – Barry Morris, Couchbase
Using AI To Triage Routine Patient Requests
The fastest win is hiding in the “front desk” of healthcare: call centers, portals and inboxes. Use existing AI to summarize, route and prep routine requests before a human touches them. In travel, great service starts before the guest reaches the desk. Measure the minutes returned to clinicians, then reinvest those minutes in patient conversations. – Joel Frenette, TravelFun.ai