Article

From reactive to proactive: Health systems look to AI, digital to flip the healthcare delivery paradigm in 5 years

2025 health system digital transformation survey
4 minutes

Overview:

Facing an increasingly difficult strategic landscape, health system executives have set a bold imperative: They must fundamentally transform healthcare operations in the next 5 years.

Against the backdrop of growing space and resource scarcity, a dwindling clinical workforce, and health demands that are surging to unprecedented levels, 150 health system executives responded to our fifth annual digital transformation survey in September 2025.

In our previous surveys, executives said they were pursuing incremental digital solutions to help ease these intractable, long-standing challenges. But now executives see a different path forward. 

This year’s survey reveals that they aim to systematically transform the reactive care delivery model that’s capital intensive and high cost. In its place, they are pursuing proactive models to deliver care that’s always on, lower cost, intelligent, and patient centric.

Executives believe they can achieve this paradigm shift by leveraging new, advanced digital and artificial intelligence (AI) tools that are unlocking new capabilities.

Key findings:

1. Health systems aim to transform from reactive to proactive care delivery in 5 years: 

  • 9 in 10 executives say they must fundamentally change how they operate in the next 5 years—from reactive to proactive care delivery—if they are to remain viable in the future.
  • Half of executives see persistent challenges and say they will grow worse unless health systems make significant changes.
  • 75% of executives say the overall sustainability of the current delivery model won’t get better without significant changes.

2. Executives are cautiously optimistic they will achieve the shift to proactive care with AI and other digital enablement: 

  • Executives believe they will achieve the shift to proactive care for transforming access (89%), personalizing the patient journey (85%), fitting resources to demand (77%), and serving more patients (75%).
  • 9 in 10 have prioritized leveraging digital and AI capabilities to achieve these goals.

3. Executives believe the key differentiators of health systems in 5 years will be digital: 

  • Most executives say size will be less of a differentiator.
  • Executives say the two greatest differentiators of leading health systems will be a digital-first experience and digitally enabled care.

Finding 1: Executives say they must fundamentally change how they operate in the next 5 years—from reactive to proactive care delivery

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Half of executives see persistent healthcare challenges

Health system executives agree that many aspects of their current healthcare delivery capabilities aren’t sufficiently addressing the most pressing challenges.  

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1 in 2 executives say challenges will get worse without significant changes 

While health systems have put forth their best efforts to address these issues, traditional approaches and incremental changes haven’t achieved the necessary impact. 3 in 4 executives say the overall sustainability of the current delivery model won’t improve without “significant changes.”

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9 in 10 agree the solution lies in transforming to proactive care delivery

Overcoming these challenges and repositioning to thrive in the next 5 years requires more than a focus on improvement. 9 in 10 executives agree that health systems must fundamentally change how they operate—shifting from reactive to proactive care delivery.

Implications

The current paradigm of reacting to patient demand as it presents at health systems’ doorsteps is inherently inefficient. And it’s simply unsustainable in the face of the known challenges of the coming 5 years. 

Health systems previously undertook significant efforts and investments to overcome growing challenges in the reactive care delivery paradigm. But they made only modest improvements as they had to rely on inefficient downstream approaches to dealing with patient health needs. 

Reactive approaches will no longer suffice. Building more beds won’t increase capacity if physicians and nurses can’t staff them. Hiring more providers isn’t an option if the pipeline isn’t keeping pace with staffing needs. And asking staff to do more in the current model risks heightened burnout and attrition.

Finding 2: Executives are cautiously optimistic they will achieve the shift to proactive care with AI and other digital enablement

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9 in 10 executives believe they will become proactive in four key area

Health system executives are prioritizing four domains to anchor the paradigm shift from reactive to proactive care delivery:

  • Transforming access to enable timely, convenient, and affordable care
  • Personalizing the patient journey with clear care plans and effective communications to engage and guide patients through their lifetime of care needs
  • Accurately projecting and fitting resources to demand based on patient care needs
  • Serving more patients through digitally enabled and automated care models that don’t require additional facility square footage or clinical headcount