Hospitals and health systems are moving patient experience to the centre of strategic planning. A 2025 survey of 101 C-suite leaders across hospital groups, academic medical centres and independent hospitals indicates a decisive shift towards digital health and virtual care to improve access, safety and satisfaction. Executives also place the underpinning technologies for virtual services among their top priorities through 2027, reflecting a tighter link between patient experience and digital delivery. At the same time, leaders acknowledge that generating a clear return on investment remains difficult across many virtual care offerings. Artificial intelligence is viewed as an enabler for both clinical and administrative progress, and many organisations anticipate a refresh of core platforms in the next one to three years.
Virtual Care, Digital Health and Patient Experience
Patient experience has risen steadily up executive agendas over the past five years and now leads strategic priorities. In 2025–2027, 59% of executives rank it as their organisation’s top strategic initiative, up from 36% in 2023, 25% in 2022 and 14% in 2020. Leaders see virtual services as integral to this push, with 72% viewing the integration of virtual care into delivery models as critical and only 15% considering it unimportant. Digital health is therefore positioned as both a means to extend care and a lever to strengthen engagement with teams and with personal health, with major or some impact reported by more than eight in ten respondents for overall experience and engagement.
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Priorities over the next two years reflect this alignment of goals and tools. Telehealth platforms are named by 50% and remote patient monitoring (RPM) by 47% as top digital health investments through 2027, signalling an emphasis on the core capabilities that enable virtual care. Leaders report recent progress in innovating virtual care delivery and improving patient experience, and they link digital health to broader organisational outcomes. Major or some impact is expected for administrative and clinical efficiencies, financial performance and billing, competitive position and brand strength, with virtually no respondents seeing no impact at all on their wider organisation or brand.
Where Hospitals See Benefits and Where ROI Falls Short
Virtual services now span the continuum, from outpatient virtual primary and specialty visits to inpatient applications such as telestroke, telesitting and teleICU, alongside hospital at home and virtual emergency department (ED) triage. Half of organisations offer virtual primary care, 59% offer RPM and 50% provide telestroke. Executives identify clear benefits: virtual primary and specialty visits are associated with improved access and higher patient satisfaction, inpatient virtual consults are expected to improve access and reduce length of stay, and telesitting, telestroke and teleICU are instrumental in patient safety. Hospital at home is viewed as improving access and reducing avoidable readmissions.
Despite these advantages, leaders report that significant ROI remains elusive for many services. Most virtual offerings are breaking even or delivering some ROI, yet relatively few achieve significant returns. The pattern varies by service. Telesitting shows significant ROI for 28% of providers, teleICU for 25%, telestroke for 16% and virtual urgent care for 22% among surveyed organisations. Hospital at home records significant ROI for 13%, with 47% reporting some ROI. Virtual ED triage stands out: although only about 10% have implemented it, 78% of those report some or significant ROI, and 56% specifically report significant ROI among surveyed organisations. This suggests potential for ED triage to become a targeted source of financial impact while also supporting improvements in access, satisfaction and both operational and clinical efficiency.
The broader enterprise impacts of digital health remain part of the calculus. Respondents associate digital tools with preventing avoidable readmissions, supporting patient acquisition and retention, and improving administrative and clinical efficiencies. These reported effects help explain why organisations continue to prioritise the technologies that underpin virtual care even as they weigh the mixed financial returns of individual services.
AI Momentum and the Coming Technology Shake-up
AI has moved into the foreground of near-term investment plans. Implementing AI technologies for clinical and administrative use sits among the top five initiatives for the next two years, now outpacing optimisation of the electronic health record (EHR) that previously led in 2023 and 2022. Leaders expect AI to expand home and remote monitoring, integrate virtual care into delivery models and drive digital transformation. Eighty-one percent say AI will have meaningful impact on expanding home and remote monitoring, 71% on integrating virtual care, and 49% on advancing the overall patient experience. AI is also viewed as supportive of revenue cycle improvements and quality scores.
Attention is turning to the foundations that enable virtual care. Organisations are almost evenly split between using the EHR to support virtual services and relying on third-party platforms, at 48% each, with 14% reporting in-house builds. Many foresee platform change on the horizon: 22% anticipate the need to invest in a new core platform within one to three years, 22% do not, and 56% say maybe. The top changes executives anticipate focus on integrating with EHRs and IT systems, improving ease of use, incorporating AI into digital health tools, continuing to improve virtual services and expanding or adding new services. The direction of travel is towards unified, easier-to-use platforms that embed AI and connect smoothly with clinical workflows and analytics.
Healthcare leaders are aligning strategy, investment and operations around patient experience, with virtual care and digital health at the centre. Offerings such as virtual visits, inpatient consults, teleservices and hospital at home are associated with gains in access, safety and satisfaction, and are linked to enterprise benefits that include efficiency, financial performance and competitive positioning. Yet ROI remains uneven, even as targeted areas like virtual ED triage show promise among surveyed organisations. Over the next one to three years, organisations are preparing for a technology refresh that emphasises integration, usability and AI. As these changes take hold, the opportunity is to translate maturing digital capabilities into consistently stronger patient experiences while maintaining a clear view on financial performance.
Source: Sage Growth Partners
Image Credit: iStock
