Innovating for the Future of Healthcare
How AI can help healthcare providers save time, simplify complex diagnostics and care for the planet
By: Phillips
Faced with ongoing staff shortages, aging populations and increasing patient demand, healthcare organizations around the world are being compelled to rethink how and where they deliver care.
Innovations from the med tech sector, including artificial intelligence, can play a crucial role in improving health outcomes and reducing the cost of care, while simultaneously lowering the environmental impact, ultimately helping to give care providers more time to focus on what matters most: patient care.
Here are three trends for 2025 highlighting the potential of innovation and AI to deliver better care to more people.
1. How innovation and AI give back time
Healthcare leaders are turning to automation to reduce the burden on staff. The 2024 Philips Future Health Index report showed that 92% of surveyed healthcare leaders think automation is critical for addressing staff shortages by relieving them of repetitive tasks and processes. An equal percentage believe it will save healthcare professionals time by reducing administrative work, allowing them to spend more time with patients.
Generative AI has emerged as a powerful tool, promising to boost clinician productivity in ways that seemed impossible just a few years ago. It’s no wonder that 85% of healthcare leaders worldwide are already investing or plan to invest in generative AI within the next three years.
Already today, generative AI can function as a virtual assistant to save time for healthcare professionals, using large language models to organize clinical notes and simplify the ways patient information is communicated across teams. In areas like cancer care, generative AI could be a game-changer by summarizing vast historical reports to give care teams immediate insights into a patient’s history. It could also speed up reporting and translate complex medical information into common terms, helping to engage patients more in their own care.
2. How innovation and AI simplify complex diagnostics
AI can also elevate the skills of healthcare professionals. With experienced staff in short supply in many healthcare systems around the world, AI can help simplify complex diagnostics, enabling less experienced professionals to provide high-quality care with confidence.
For example, recent advances in AI have made cardiac CT easier to use, making it accessible to more facilities to increase capacity and deliver better cardiac care to more people. In addition, less experienced technicians can rely on remote consultations and expert training for virtual support and reassurance. Similarly, embedding AI in ultrasound systems allows physicians to detect, diagnose and monitor cardiac conditions more confidently and efficiently.
Integrating AI into cancer treatments can also enhance patient care by addressing the increased risk of heart disease associated with therapies such as radiation and chemotherapy. Studies show that adult cancer survivors across a wide range of cancers face a 37% higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease [1]. The latest AI technologies can quickly detect signs of cardiotoxicity early in the treatment process by automating and accelerating echocardiographic measurements. Improved reproducibility and shorter study times make the process more efficient and reliable, reducing the risk of treatment delays. That’s good news for cancer patients who may otherwise face serious heart issues alongside their recovery.
3. How innovation and AI support sustainability
We’ve seen how AI holds immense potential to transform healthcare, increase efficiency and improve lives. And now, AI is also starting to help improve sustainability for organizations – including within healthcare technology.
Healthcare has a significant environmental footprint, accounting for 4.4% of global CO2 emissions [2] – more than either the aviation or shipping industries. So there is the opportunity for AI to be used to help analyze supply chains and identify areas for improvement, reduce waste, improve facility management, and help increase imaging speed, translating into lower power consumption per patient scan. Operational efficiencies like this are just the start.
Yet digital solutions need considerable energy and materials to operate. Greenhouse gas emissions from Information and Communications Technology (including servers, computers, phones, and more) are expected to increase to 14% by 2040 [3]. With increased digitalization in healthcare, there is growing recognition that managing and minimizing the energy, material and water needs for AI will be essential to ensure the least impact on the environment.
Through the development and embedding of standards and guidelines for green software and AI, greater transparency of their environmental impact can be created, allowing healthcare providers to make more conscious choices when it comes to addressing the impacts of climate change and ensuring a healthier future for all.
A call for collaboration
As the demands on healthcare systems grow ever more complex, we need urgent and interdisciplinary collaboration from everyone – from engineers and developers to healthcare professionals and policymakers – to ensure a healthier future for all.
Technology alone is not enough. With half of the global population still lacking access to basic healthcare today [4], Philips continues to drive innovation that empowers caregivers, improves workflows and outcomes, to deliver better care for more people.
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Read more about what’s next in healthcare in the 2024 Philips Future Health Index global report.
Sources
[1] https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jacc.2022.04.042
[2] https://noharm-global.org/documents/health-care-climate-footprint-report
[3] Assessing ICT global emissions footprint: Trends to 2040 & recommendations. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2017.12.239