The end of the year can only mean one thing: it's time to take step back and assess the state of things. HealthCare Business News went around the healthcare industry to find out what industry leaders had to say about the lessons from 2021 and what we can expect in 2022. Here are some of the responses we received.

We may look back on 2021 as the year interoperability finally turned the corner. With the 2016 21st Century Cures Act and the resulting 2020 ONC and CMS Interoperability Rules pointing the way toward FHIR standards-based interoperability, we are seeing a national consensus that patients should have access to their medical data on our smart phones and via FHIR. Active FHIR accelerators programs such as the CARIN Alliance, the Da Vinci Project and Gravity Project are expanding the scale and scope of FHIR enhancing the core work of HL7 in bringing these standards to life.

2022 will see rich work continuing the evolution of FHIR’s scale as cloud computing software stacks provide new ways to convert data from legacy provider and payer data stores into FHIR resources allowing APIs to fuel better ways to engage and serve patients wherever they seek care. These tools include new ways to provide privacy and security in a consumer-friendly way. The Bulk FHIR spec is on track to finally move us from today’s narrow measures of clinical value to a true learning health system informed by the same types of interoperable “Big Data” analytics tools that have provided vast value to consumers in the rest of the economy. This has been a long time coming.
- Don Rucker, MD, chief strategy officer for 1upHealth

We can safely say that 2021 was the year DNA sequencing for diagnosing and treating disease truly became mainstream. By the time the Omicron variant was detected late in the year, terms such as “PCR test” had entered common parlance – clear evidence that both healthcare professionals and the general population understand the role that genetics plays in combatting the COVID-19 virus. Very quickly, those at the forefront of healthcare innovation recognized how important it is to apply next-generation sequencing (NGS) technologies to a wide range of diseases and conditions.

No longer can the critical value of precision medicine be questioned. Industry leaders will seek to expand and scale their use of genetic and genomic data in clinical decision making across healthcare environments. Those who fail to get on board will risk becoming obsolete, not unlike surgeons who dismissed laparoscopy in the late 1980s. So-called “tipping points” are rarely identified as they are happening, but it’s clear that is what the industry is witnessing today.
- Joel Diamond, MD, FAAFP, chief medical officer at 2bPrecise; PCP Handelsman Family Practice

Managing workforce issues was top of mind for healthcare executives in 2021 and will continue through 2022. As a result, in 2022 there will be accelerated adoption of digital solutions that address workforce woes all the way from hiring to resource management. This includes digital solutions that let health systems tap into different streams of workers, like those in the gig economy, and process automation tools to ensure existing staff are working top-of-license. Implementing tools, such as intelligent scheduling to optimize throughput in the operating room or predictive and prescriptive staffing solutions to plan for staffing needs weeks or months in advance, will not only help health systems operate efficiently, but can also bring in additional revenue.

Secondly, healthcare will look beyond the brick and mortar to transform care delivery with further adoption of care-at-home services. Health systems and hospitals should focus on implementing or expanding their remote patient monitoring services for post-discharge recovery and chronic care management. Remote monitoring can prevent readmissions, lower the cost of care, and improve clinical outcomes and patient satisfaction. It also expands the physical and personnel capacity of a health system and is foundational to hospital-at-home service. Health systems may be wise not to go it alone and start building capacity by partnering with care-at-home providers.
- Linda Finkel, CEO of AVIA

The pandemic has disrupted various aspects of the global supply chain and the lasting impact will be seen into 2022 and beyond. Healthcare is one industry that has been hit hard by supply chain issues, from a lack of medical supplies in hospitals at the onset of the pandemic to shortages of computer chips used to develop and maintain healthcare IT systems. The delays are hamstringing the production of new, innovative solutions in this industry that has already been set back significantly by COVID-19. In conjunction with these issues, healthcare organizations are experiencing tremendous staffing shortages, impacting their ability to provide care.

On the other hand, the supply chain difficulty, combined with the shift to a remote workforce, is not without a silver lining as it has accelerated the industry’s move to the cloud. This has created an environment where organizations, hindered by a lack of resources from creating their own on-premise systems, are instead looking into other options. This shift will likely continue well into the new year, and healthcare organizations will need to navigate the challenges and opportunities associated with moving data and information from legacy systems into a cloud environment.
- Dr. Emad Rizk, president and CEO of Cotiviti

Trends and momentum in healthcare interoperability have never been more exciting because we are experiencing more broad adoption of FHIR, and the pandemic has resulted in tangible cross-organization information sharing. We’re also starting to see an acceleration of APIs that EHRs are exposing. Its part of the vision set out years ago in the 21st Century Cures Act and is starting to become possible if not fully adopted in today’s world.

I suggest keeping a close watch on the Cures 2.0 bill. We expect it will have bipartisan support and eventually become law. Cures 1.0 is focuses on how we transform healthcare, and Cures 2.0 s more reactionary specific to the pandemic. I expect a version of this bill to become law in the future, which will lead to more structural drivers for healthcare in the U.S.
- Drew Ivan, chief product and strategy officer at Lyniate

If I had to pick one word to describe all our lives over the past few years, it would of course be “unprecedented” – a term we have all overused and grown to resent throughout the course of the pandemic but one that encapsulates our experience perfectly. It is hard to predict what the year ahead will hold at a time like this, but in 2022 I think we will see more widescale adoption of advanced technologies in healthcare and an increased focus on collecting and analyzing health data. The transition to a fully remote or hybrid workforce over the past couple of years, combined with consumer preference for digital options, will accelerate provider and payers’ sense of urgency to go fully digital. Assets like artificial intelligence, machine learning, advanced analytics, automation, and other technologies will optimize care delivery, drive better consumer experiences, improve staff deployment and the management of back-office services – ultimately reducing costs and improving outcomes.

From my perspective, healthcare constituents will benefit from welcoming digitization and modernization with open arms in the year ahead. Investing in technologies that enhance the consumer experience is essential in an increasingly changing healthcare landscape where new entrants from non-traditional healthcare backgrounds are disrupting the market with their knowledge of the consumer. Offering digital tools and omnichannel communications to consumers will be crucial to ensure they are getting the personalized care they need based on their preferences and can also help them meet financial responsibilities. I believe that organizations will recognize the benefits of outsourcing technologies that enable targeted consumer outreach, digitize intake, and modernize processes overall.
- Venkatgiri Vandali, president of healthcare and lifesciences at Firstsource

2021 was a memorable year from the perspective of wrestling with solutions to combat COVID-19 while at the same time attempting to get back to a semblance of a normal life. Most of our attention was taken up finding ways to address mask mandates and vaccine deniers. We have to hope that in 2022 we can get back to the business of improving healthcare while acknowledging that we will have to continue to live with COVID-19.

These are some of my predictions for healthcare and health IT as we look ahead to 2022.Healthcare becomes more personalized and participatory with technology support facilitated through enhanced patient engagement tools, integrating patient-generated data into the medical record, and focusing on health equity and access to care. The Digital Front Door is an exciting recent development in the long evolution to a more patient-centric health system for which we anticipate increasing demand. Remote monitoring tools and applications have demonstrated value in safely managing many specific conditions, for example congestive heart failure. I believe we will see the use of remote monitoring to continue and expand in its adoption. Public health will be a priority as COVID-19 proved our public health infrastructure is weak and unprepared. There will continue to be concerns around well-described, long-standing issues such as provider burnout, workforce shortage, and complex, siloed IT systems. Planned improvements to increased interoperability across the country will help alleviate these issues.
- Dr. Chris Hobson, chief medical officer at Orion Health

Over the last few years, artificial intelligence (AI) has been the prominent buzzword in healthcare. Many in the industry were quick to buy-in to the promise of AI, with many believing AI would be the end all, be all in healthcare. However, we medical professionals and technologists must be careful not to overpromise the value of AI. For instance, while this type of technology can have an incredible impact on healthcare as we know it, for it to be truly transformative, AI and machine learning (ML) tools must first be trained on “clean” and robust data that is representative of the entire population. AI that is trained on diverse image and datasets provides clinicians with accurate, reliable resources to augment decision-making and promote health equity.

With studies consistently revealing that certain AI algorithms lack representation of people of color, relying solely on these resources can exacerbate racial disparities and biases in care. An increased focus on education, awareness, and use of equitable resources can help achieve health equity and shift our perception of AI to augmented intelligence instead of artificial. AI and ML is not meant to replace humans but rather to be an assistive tool that helps providers overcome knowledge gaps and provide equal and consistent care to all populations.
- Art Papier, MD, CEO of VisualDx