A digital transformation is underway in healthcare and health technology. But what exactly do the smart hospitals of the future look like? Are we heading for a fully virtual health experience?

Whether it’s AI and machine learning, or another form of innovation – it’s clear to see that health tech, and healthcare, is changing drastically. The words “smart hospital” and “virtual hospital wards” have eased their way into our vocabulary – and they will soon be the driving force of healthcare everywhere. So what would smart hospitals look like? And what should we be expecting between now and 2050? We asked some of the leading experts in the field to give us their predictions as well as their expertise on what the healthcare of the next few decades will look like.

AI and future smart hospitals 

AI engineer Kim de los Reyes, who runs Seek AI, said we “have to think about AI” in order to support staff from feeling overburdened, and under-supported.”

She added: “We desperately need to find creative AI solutions that enhance healthcare workers’ roles, and support them in their stressful, demanding roles. 

AI in healthcare is “limitless”

She added: “The future of AI in hospitals and healthcare in general is limitless. 

“The number one factor holding back better, faster adaptability of AI solutions is the lack of willingness and hesitancy of current healthcare leadership and systems. 

“But trends are showing that this will change and like other sectors, will adapt.

“AI has the ability to truly transform the patient care experience and enhance their healthcare journey, like offering faster, more accurate life saving diagnoses or improving the communication gap between patients and healthcare teams (which is truly a headache for patients in many ways). 

“Of course there will be solutions in the patient monitoring, medication development, surgical intervention, etc.

“AI has the ability and capability to humanise healthcare by offering support systems and solutions to enhance healthcare team and patient connections.”

Becky Warnes is an award-winning, independent business consultant  who supports NHS and industry with digital and commercial strategy. 

She foresees the use of AI in diagnostics as “commonplace”, and says that many existing hospital buildings could turn into community hubs, in which specialist clinical services, general practice and community teams work alongside each other.

Speaking with Health Tech World, Becky added: “I think in the next 20 years, AI will be commonplace in diagnostics, and be trusted as a stand alone diagnostic tool in some instances.

“Before that, I think AI will be used to predict and track diseases, playing a big role in population health management. 

“As big data sets become more useful and less biased (with or without synthetic data) the opportunities to enhance people’s lives and reduce demand on healthcare services is huge.

“Even supporting the design of new hospital building by analysing patient flow and demand on each service, would create massive efficiencies for service commissioners, clinicians and patients.”

Hospitals in 2050

When asked how hospitals may look in 2050, she added: “In big cities or densely populated environments I can see the development (or redeployment) of existing hospital sites into community hubs where specialist clinical services, general practice and community teams work alongside each other. 

“Separate surgical hubs would become the norm within this smart hospital environment.

In areas less densely populated I think core services like surgery and diagnostics will remain, but general consultations will take place virtually, and by teams of clinicians working in various locations via a remote hub type model.”

Hospital EHRs will be “obsolete”

Becky continued: “Hospital EHRs will be obsolete as the patient becomes the data controller, using a variety of wearables and sensors to monitor vital signs day to day, and sharing that data on a needs only basis. 

“The focus from hospitals and health commissioners will be on promoting wellbeing and  prevention through population health management, rather than responding to the effects of bad life choices and poor education around health matters. Using XR and apps to educate and empower entire populations. 

“I can see AI, IOT sensors and digital twins used to support the design and build of buildings.”

Chief Medical Officer and Chief Innovation Officer at Sheba Medical Center, Israel, Prof. Eyal Zimlichman, said that hospitals are “finally catching up” with advances in medicine, and expects big changes by 2050. 

He said: “The hospital of 2050 will be both significantly smaller and vastly wider-reaching than those of today, providing a largely virtual-first experience for patients.

“Rather than monitoring illnesses and diseases in a traditional clinical setting, most patient care work will be conducted remotely through telehealth technology, while at-home advanced healthcare services will be the accepted norm.

“Physicians will be supported in every area by AI and Machine Learning technology that will provide data-driven recommendations, helping patients get accurate and timely diagnoses and medication recommendations while not having to physically come into the hospital.

“Even medical fields like surgery will migrate out of the hospital and into surgical community centres, with many surgeries being easier and shorter due to the introduction of advanced robotics.”

“Shouldn’t expect” hospitals to go fully virtual

Pritesh Mistry, policy fellow of digital technology at The King’s Fund, shared his insights about the hospitals of the future. He said: “It’s likely hospitals will be very different by 2050.

“An increasing amount of diagnostics and monitoring will be done at home, thanks to new technology like cameras that can be swallowed in a pill and patients using the camera on their mobile phone to diagnose symptoms.

“These advances in remote monitoring could be combined with virtual reality technology to support patients to rehabilitate at home, with wearables tech to monitor progress and ensure safety.

“While we shouldn’t expect hospitals to go fully virtual, we can expect greater use of remote consultations, utilising video and artificial intelligence, with in-person consultations available when necessary.

“There is also huge potential for greater use of robotics in surgery, especially for complex operations.

“Robotics could also be used for moving patients and could help ensure high levels of hygiene.

He added: “Artificial intelligence is already being used for image analysis and segmentation. Beyond this, there is huge potential for simple AI to be used in everything from virtual assistants providing task management support, to language processing for medical information capture.”

Integrated care

Kay Chand, Partner at Browne Jacobson and expertise in health and central government, said: 

“Our health and social care system in the long future could be a mixture of smart hospital buildings, with state of the art medical devices and back office systems utilising machine learning and seamless communication across integrated care systems in a secure, stable and resilient manner.

“Health and social care in the future may be an intelligent ecosystem supporting the entire patient care journey.

She added: “In the short to medium term, the focus is on levelling up with EPR systems and ensuring security and stability across existing and newly implemented solutions. However, we are seeing refreshed/upgraded technologies to provide hospital-at-home solutions. 

“We are also seeing continuing advancements in medical devices and hospital facilities such as robotic arms carrying out remote surgeries and smart hospital beds. 

Kay also mentioned how digital solutions (including AI and machine learning) are a key component in transforming our health and social care sector. 

The “quiet revolution” of healthcare

Jeremy Kagan, CEO and founder of CardioLync: ” The hospital of the future is already taking shape. 

“The Covid-19 crisis forced the issue to treat patients as much as possible and feasible outside and away from the hospital. 

“It created a situation where patients were too afraid to go to hospital for fear of exposure, and where hospitals were extremely short staffed. Technologies that until then had been mere curiosities or “futuristic” stepped up to the plate, and performed admirably. 

“This effected a quiet revolution in how healthcare is delivered, and the wheel is not turning back.  

“Many hospital networks are factoring in remote care to their bottom line, and HMOs like Clalit Health Fund in Israel are actually counting on their patients’ homes to create as they see it “the largest hospital in the country”.

The future of generalised to “precision” healthcare

Anirvan Chatterjee –  Founder and CEO at Haystack Analytics Pvt. Ltd, told us: “There are two broad trends in healthcare: Preventive and Critical care. 

“In the case of preventive healthcare, the focus is to limit the footfalls into hospitals by way of preventive diagnostics (wearables, regular health check ups, point of care testing, AI based models for converging all data for continuous monitoring and prediction). 

“One of the outcomes of this trend is that several current day services provided by the hospital are going to be made redundant.

“While this may appear too challenging for current revenue models, eventually, hospitals will become largely highly specialised caregiving centres.”

He added: “In a nutshell, healthcare is progressing from being generalised to precision and eventually personalised. 

“The hospital environment, including the electronic health records, out-patient, in-patient and surgical departments will be significantly altered for reducing the number of hours spent in the hospital and choice of interventions to be administered within the hospital.”

Challenges for hospitals of the future

Ethar Alali, Founder and CEO of Automedi said that the hospitals of the future face numerous challenges. He added: One is staffing. Greater health demand is not being matched by greater capacity. In some regions, more doctors are leaving the service than entering it.

“Forcing health services to do more with less capacity, in the context of an ever-ageing population and now, a large backlog. “Furthermore, transit between home or residential care, creates demand on both ambulance services and hospital care.

“There is going to be a critical need for localised care with remote monitoring of patient conditions, for more informed treatments within larger catchments, customisable medical treatment pathways and an effective supply chain, for greater care efficacy within stretched services.”

He concluded: “Acute hospitals may become smaller, more distributed, with bed capacity augmented with clinical services that are closer to patient demand.”

5G and 6G in predictions for future hospitals 

Jayne Rooke, Health and Care sector lead at innovation and digital acceleration company WM5G, expects hospitals to become smaller and better connected over the next 10 years, making greater use of satellite, 5G and 6G technologies to improve patient care.

She said: “Improved connectivity is set to revolutionise the way we deliver healthcare over the coming years, allowing doctors and nursing staff to access and transfer patient records and imagery on the move reliably, wherever they are.

“Expanding virtual wards will also ensure patients spend much less time in physical hospitals than previously and can be discharged earlier, with Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled remote monitoring devices at home helping make sure patients don’t simply bounce back into hospital.

“Some treatments and emergency responses will always require physical hospital beds and in-hospital equipment but Smart Hospitals – those using a combination of connectivity, artificial intelligence (AI), digitally-enabled care and data analytics – will reduce the load by enabling more care to be safely delivered remotely.

“In terms of what that might look like in real life, AI will be used across hospital systems in the back office to support better administrative processes, while in clinical settings they will be used to enhance the ability of clinicians to make accurate, timely diagnoses. “

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