It has been evident for some time that the future of healthcare will be digital and data-driven. With the onset of the pandemic, the traditional model of bringing patients in for every medical reason came to an abrupt end. The long-anticipated telehealth revolution was thrust upon us by necessity, rather than choice. Enabled by a wide range of policy flexibilities, the COVID-19 pandemic catalyzed a dramatic increase in adoption of telehealth by providers and consumers alike. There is consensus that use rates seen during the pandemic will eventually settle at a lower rate, but above pre-pandemic levels. The necessity to use telehealth removed a key barrier: resistance to use! It will be hard to take away payment after consumers have gotten used to it, doctors are being reimbursed for using it, and everybody has invested time and energy in figuring out how to do it.

The primary motivation now for providers to continue to extend the breadth and scale of technology-enabled virtual care services is the potential to strengthen their capacity to facilitate greater access to services, greater integration of services, and shifting care outside institutional settings. Patient experience (PX) with the healthcare services they receive should improve as a result. For example, digital tools and platforms can expand geographic reach and offer consumers greater convenience through their potential to eliminate time limitations and expand service hours. Importantly, providers will have the ability to address a broader spectrum of patient needs, serving the whole person with one convenient, integrated experience.

For providers, digital tools and platforms may help not only scale service capacity, but also use human resources more efficiently, such as allowing staff to manage a larger number of patients. The ability of providers to effectively integrate virtual care services into workflows will facilitate patient access to specialty care services that are not readily accessible for populations in underserved and remote communities, support patients in communicating with care teams, ensure continuity in care, and engage and activate patients in managing their own care remotely. Virtual care services will also help lower avoidable costs by reducing missed appointments and preventable utilization of healthcare services. The layering of large-scale data and analytical capabilities on top of virtual care services will provide increased capabilities for predictive and individualized care, as well as interventions targeting population health improvement.

Service innovation can improve PX during engagement with services by removing friction in the healthcare experience and making it more seamless through designing a high-quality customer journey process. Virtual care services will rely on enabling technology developments in other sectors to drive innovative service designs and business models. The application of artificial intelligence (AI) will lead to chatbots and virtual health assistants providing virtual triage capabilities and supporting patients with navigating health services, as well as with managing conditions. AI will also enable caregivers in the home setting to directly care for family members by producing daily sets of tasks, guidelines, and educational content, as well as providing virtual assistants and chatbots for real-time support. The home setting will also benefit from smart consumer devices that serve as the hub for device connectivity and data integration, and provide real-time decision support for healthy behavior change and actionable, customized, and predictive insights.

Despite digital doors having become a channel strategy for improving patient engagement at each major touchpoint of the care journey using technology that individuals are familiar with, the pandemic also exposed digital inequities in access, affordability, and literacy as a social determinant of health that threatens to exacerbate health disparities for certain populations. While experts doubt the federal investments in broadband infrastructure and digital equity will take care of all of America’s broadband problems, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act should do much to change that. Specifically, the Act is set to make a significant $65 billion digital equity investment in broadband deployment in unserved and underserved areas, as well as anchor institutions in communities across the US, and adoption through subsidies for services, as well as digital inclusion efforts to assist with economic and workforce development goals, including educational, health, and civil engagement outcomes.