Greater than two-thirds of leaders from well being plans and well being methods anticipate outperforming their opponents in 2026, based on a latest report from Deloitte.
Nonetheless, many don’t have a really assured outlook for the healthcare business. About 43% of leaders really feel “unsure” or “impartial” in regards to the business’s near-term outlook, up from 28% final 12 months. That is primarily attributable to coverage and regulatory uncertainty, such because the expiration of Reasonably priced Care Act subsidies and uncertainty relating to the Medicare telehealth flexibilities.
“A majority of U.S. well being system and well being plan leaders predict to outperform their opponents subsequent 12 months, however doing so by following their conventional playbook,” mentioned Alicia Janisch, vice chair and U.S. well being care sector chief at Deloitte, in an interview. “Nonetheless, these conventional methods might fall brief amongst all of the mounting monetary and regulatory pressures which might be occurring in healthcare. Our outlook findings indicated rising nervousness about coverage shifts, persistent affordability points in a transformational second proper now for digital adoption and care fashions.”
Deloitte’s 2026 U.S. Healthcare Outlook Survey obtained responses from 120 U.S. C-suite executives from well being plans and well being methods. Extra findings from the report embody:
1. Funding in digital supply: Shoppers are persevering with to obtain care digitally attributable to comfort. Greater than 90% of shoppers who had a digital well being go to say they’d be prepared to have one other. As well as, 37% of shoppers use monitoring gadgets for well being circumstances and 47% use gadgets for health and well being monitoring.
Due to this curiosity amongst shoppers, about 60% of well being plan and well being system executives report that they plan to spend money on digital well being providers to help preventive care.
2. Scaling AI: Greater than 80% of leaders imagine that gen AI and agentic AI can present “moderate-to-significant worth throughout a variety of features in 2026, from medical and enterprise operations to back-office features.” Nonetheless, 49% of organizations are nonetheless experimenting with AI and 18% of organizations haven’t adopted AI in any respect. Solely a 3rd of healthcare organizations are utilizing AI at scale.
The areas the place gen AI and agentic AI can add worth for payers and well being methods embody enabling medical care, decreasing administrative burden and enhancing client and workforce experiences.
“Reaching scale with AI means implementing the know-how enterprisewide and realizing measurable monetary affect,” the report said. “Well being care organizations that deploy AI throughout a number of features—quite than isolating it inside particular departments—can broadly cut back administrative burdens, speed up decision-making, and improve outcomes and client experiences.”
3. Partnering with different industries: About 80% of executives say that collaborating with different industries — comparable to retail, tech and grocery — is a C-suite precedence. For instance, working with community-based organizations may also help handle social and financial wants, whereas partnering with retailers can handle food-related wants.
“It is very important take into consideration becoming a member of forces and what innovation can come [from] trying outdoors of healthcare,” Janisch mentioned.
Thai Noipho, Getty Pictures
