What You Should Know:
- Deloitte’s 2026 US Health Care Outlook reveals a dangerous disconnect: while nearly 70% of health executives expect to outperform competitors next year, the "traditional playbook" of market expansion and cost-cutting is no longer sufficient.
- Amid rising regulatory uncertainty and financial pressure, the report identifies three mandatory pivots for survival: empowering consumer health with digital experiences, scaling generative and agentic AI across
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Health IT | News, Analysis, Insights - HIT Consultant
From Confusion to Collections: How Unclear Billing Fuels the Medical Debt Crisis
Medical debt remains a significant burden for patients nationwide, with U.S. residents collectively owing an estimated $220 billion. Medical visits already bring emotional and financial stress, and confusing bills only make matters worse. When patients receive statements that they don’t understand, or multiple, fragmented bills, they’re left frustrated, less likely to pay on time, and are at greater risk of accumulating medical debt.
While the July 2025 ruling striking down the Consumer
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The VBC Paradox: Why Hospitals Are Doubling Down on Value-Based Care While Revenue at Risk Lags
What You Should Know:
- A new report from Sage Growth Partners reveals a striking disconnect in the healthcare industry: while only 20% of C-suite leaders believe progress has been made in value-based care (VBC) recently, 77% plan to increase their participation in these models over the next two years.
- The "plot twist" indicates that despite operational hurdles and low revenue exposure today, hospital executives view VBC as essential for long-term financial survival. The data
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Beyond the Margin Squeeze: How Specialty Providers Use RCM Automation to Combat Rising Costs
Despite a recent uptick in margins, providers continue to face significant pressure on their revenue cycles as a result of potential reimbursement cuts, workforce recruitment challenges, and higher costs.
Providers in 2024 reported operating margins of 1.2%, up from -0.5% the prior year, according to a report from Fitch. Nonetheless, margins remain “well below” pre-pandemic levels, and looming federal cuts to Medicaid funding could be devastating for some providers.
Federal
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Fighting Physician Burnout: OhioHealth Deploys Abridge AI Across 200+ Care Sites
What You Should Know:
- OhioHealth has announced a massive expansion of Abridge's generative AI platform to thousands of ambulatory clinicians across its 50-county network.
- The decision follows a pilot program that delivered a 59% reduction in cognitive load and a 28% decrease in after-hours documentation time for providers. By automating clinical notes and integrating deeply with the EHR, OhioHealth aims to restore the human connection in patient care, with plans to explore future
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KLAS 2025 Report: Chartis and Impact Advisors Lead as Hospitals Seek IT Planning Expertise
What You Should Know:
- As healthcare IT environments grow increasingly complex, a new KLAS Decision Insights report reveals that health systems are turning to external firms primarily for high-level strategic planning and IT assessments.
- The study, based on 38 purchase decisions between 2023 and 2025, identifies Chartis, Impact Advisors, and Healthlink Advisors as the most frequently considered partners. Crucially, the data shows that expertise and cultural alignment are the
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Joy Parenting Club Acquires Heba Care to Scale the First Comprehensive, AI-Powered Parenting Platform
What You Should Know:
- Joy Parenting Club, the platform aiming to revolutionize the parenting experience, has announced its acquisition of Heba Care, a technology platform that supports families navigating complex health and developmental needs.
- This acquisition marks Joy's latest step in building the most comprehensive support ecosystem for parents.
Integration Brings Clinically Validated Tools and New Tracker to Deliver 24/7 Guidance
Simultaneously, Joy unveiled a new
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Kaufman Hall Report: Rising Non-Labor Costs and Payer Denials Squeeze Hospital Margins in 2025
What You Should Know:
- According to Kaufman Hall’s 2025 Health System Performance Outlook, hospitals are facing a "financial trifecta" of rising non-labor expenses, workforce instability, and aggressive payer reimbursement pressures.
- Nearly 60% of health systems reported non-labor cost increases of up to 10%, driven by inflation and tariffs, while 44% cited high claim denial rates as a top challenge. As bad debt rises and staffing levels tighten, the report urges leaders to
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The $4,000 Deductible Era: Why Employer-Sponsored Insurance is Breaking the American Worker
What You Should Know:
- A new 50-state analysis reveals that over half (51.7%) of U.S. private-sector workers are now enrolled in high-deductible health plans (HDHPs) as employers struggle to manage rising costs. The report shows that annual family premiums jumped to $24,540 in 2024, outpacing inflation, while average family deductibles surpassed $4,000 for the first time.
- The trend exposes millions of Americans to greater financial risk in medical emergencies, signaling a
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CliniComp SVP Talks New Era EHR: How AI-Driven, Interoperable Platforms Are Replacing Legacy Health IT Systems
With 97% of health data currently going unused and clinician burnout at crisis levels, the healthcare industry is facing a critical inflection point: the transition from legacy "systems of record" to dynamic "systems of intelligence." In this deep-dive interview, Sandra Johnson, Senior Vice President of Client Services at CliniComp, outlines the architecture of the "New Era EHR"—a platform defined not by static documentation, but by agility, true interoperability, and embedded AI.
Johnson
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