July 3, 2025

📰 Straight Outta Health IT | July 2025 Edition

Author: Christopher Kunney, FHIMSS, eFACHDM, MSMOT - Health IT Changemaker

🧠 What Is Agentic AI?

As artificial intelligence continues to mature, Agentic AI is emerging as a transformative force. Unlike traditional AI, which responds to prompts, Agentic AI is proactive—capable of setting its own goals, planning multi-step actions, and executing complex tasks with little to no human intervention.

According to Google Cloud, Agentic AI is designed to operate autonomously across complex environments. Imagine a digital chief of staff that doesn’t just process information—it acts on it, learns from experience, and optimizes performance over time.

💡 Why Healthcare Should Care

Healthcare is under immense pressure: rising costs, staffing shortages, clinician burnout, and growing patient complexity. Agentic AI offers a powerful response—augmenting human capacity while improving care delivery and outcomes.

🔄 Five Ways Agentic AI Is Reshaping Healthcare

1. Smarter Clinical Workflows

Agentic AI can manage the full care continuum—from identifying at-risk patients to scheduling appointments and notifying care teams. Tools like those from athenahealth already demonstrate this potential.

2. Relief for Burned-Out Clinicians

By automating documentation, billing, and prior authorizations, Agentic AI eases the administrative burden. Ambient scribe tools are reclaiming valuable time for physicians.

3. Personalized & Proactive Care

Agentic systems continuously analyze real-time data—EHRs, labs, wearables—and dynamically adjust care plans. This enables earlier interventions and reduced readmissions, particularly in chronic disease management.

4. Operational Optimization

Hospitals are applying Agentic AI to streamline staff scheduling, supply chains, and financial processes. Companies like UiPath are already implementing agentic automation in healthcare environments.

5. Improved Diagnostic Accuracy

With agent-based reasoning, AI tools can manage diagnostics end-to-end—ordering tests, interpreting results, and recommending next steps. Microsoft’s “medical superintelligent” agents have even outperformed physicians in controlled diagnostic scenarios.

⚖️ Opportunities vs. Challenges

✅ Opportunity ⚠️ Challenge Personalized care at scale Ensuring safety, accuracy, and trust Clinician time and well-being Addressing algorithmic bias Efficient, intelligent workflows Navigating HIPAA and regulatory barriers Better patient outcomes Maintaining meaningful human oversight

Success hinges on ethical design, transparency, human-in-the-loop models, and compliance frameworks.

🔮 The Road Ahead

Agentic AI is not a futuristic concept—it’s already in motion. As capabilities advance and regulation evolves, healthcare leaders have a rare opportunity to shape the next era of care delivery.

This is about more than automation. It’s about building AI that serves health, empowers teams, and respects the dignity of every patient.

Let’s ensure it’s equitable, inclusive, and built with integrity.

💬 Join the Conversation

How is your organization preparing for the rise of Agentic AI? What guardrails and governance models are you exploring?

Let’s connect. Share your thoughts in the comments or message me directly.