mckinsey Archives - Digital Health Wire

Healthcare can cover a lot of ground when it’s moving at the speed of AI, and a new report from McKinsey found that the AI conversation is quickly shifting from proof-of-concept to proof-of-return.

The analysis was based on a survey of U.S. healthcare execs spanning payors, providers, and health services/technology groups.

AI adoption is skyrocketing at all of them. For the first time since McKinsey began tracking the metric in 2023, the orgs that have already implemented GenAI outnumbered those that haven’t.

Half of respondents have deployed at least one GenAI use case at their organization, up from just 25% two years ago. Here’s a nice graphic on AI adoption by org type.

McKinsey found that leadership teams are no longer questioning whether and where GenAI is relevant, they’re focusing on how it can be used responsibly at scale.

Agents are also building momentum. Despite being the new kid on the AI block, 19% of orgs reported that they’ve deployed agentic AI capabilities.

That’s not a huge percentage considering all the new agents we’ve been covering, but another 51% of orgs are actively pursuing agentic AI proofs-of-concept.

Administrative efficiency is the priority. This chart breaks down the areas that respondents see the most potential for GenAI and multiagent systems.

87% ranked administrative efficiency as their leading GenAI use case.
76% said it was also their top priority for multiagent systems.
Software infrastructure and engagement trailed as distant contenders for both categories.

Adoption varies by org type. Here’s the overview.

Providers are leaning in on clinical productivity (54% are using GenAI to help).
Payers are prioritizing administrative efficiency (34%).
Health services and tech firms are using GenAI as software infrastructure (52%).

Adoption barriers had more overlap. Across all org types, the chief concerns with GenAI were difficulty integrating with existing workflows, risk/liability, and inaccuracies/bias.

The other shared belief? Nobody implements AI for fun. Everyone expects an ROI.

The Takeaway

AI has arrived in a big way, and McKinsey’s report confirmed that ROI is now the name of the game in every corner of the industry.

In an effort to understand healthcare’s shift from the hospital to the home, McKinsey conducted a survey of physicians who serve the Medicare population, finding that $265B of care services could switch from traditional facilities to the home by 2025.

That figure represents a nearly fourfold increase in the amount of care being delivered in the home, which McKinsey thinks could be attainable without a reduction in quality or access. This chart provides an overview of how it might be possible.

McKinsey categorizes the services that can be delivered at home into three groups:

Services with capabilities in place that may benefit from scaling, such as primary care, outpatient-specialist consults, hospice, and outpatient behavioral-health visits.

Services where capabilities exist that could be stitched together into a comprehensive offering, such as dialysis, post-acute care, and long-term care, and infusions.

Services with some capabilities but others that could be further developed, which includes a single service, acute care.

All of these services offer potential for growth within the home, although the pros and cons of transferring care outside of a traditional setting depends on the stakeholder (here’s a breakdown). Payors and providers will each have their own reasons for shifting care into homes over the next few years, but McKinsey points out that there’s one main driver behind the expected growth: more home care is good for patients.

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