Digital transformation in healthcare

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Healthcare and Life Science Digital Transformation and
Innovation Primer for 2020
Published 24 January 2020 - ID G00714345 - 10 min read
By Analysts Mandi Bishop, Michael Shanler, Bryan Cole, Laura Craft, Jeff Cribbs, Mark Gilbert
Initiatives:Healthcare and Life Science Digital Transformation and Innovation
Healthcare and life science disruption demands sophisticated IT to achieve digital
transformation and critical business objectives. CIOs should use this research to prepare for
and navigate future challenges and opportunities of the increasingly dynamic healthcare
ecosystem.
Scope
Competitive differentiation amid rapid healthcare and life science industry changes requires
insights, frameworks and strategies to deliver value from new business and operating models.
The core topics this initiative covers are:
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account executive if you wish to discuss expanding your access to Gartner content.
Analysis
Figure 1. Healthcare and Life Science Digital Transformation and Innovation Overview
Industry dynamics: trends, business and operating models, innovation — Distills the global
patterns, policies and shifting dynamics that are shaping healthcare of the future and dives
deeply into the IT implications.
■
Digital strategy: digital business, industry platform models, IT strategy — Details digitalization
strategies, frameworks, processes and practices that will enable organizations’ transformation
goals.
■
Advanced intelligence and insight: data curation, AI, analytics strategy — Illuminates best
practices, strategies and core competencies across all aspects of healthcare and life science
artificial intelligence (AI), data and analytics delivery excellence including people, process,
platforms and vendors.
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Gartner
Shifting geopolitical climates, massive medical advances, exploding numbers of digital devices
and services, and digital giant disruptors are accelerating healthcare and life science
transformation. For example, AI is at the peak of hype and is the most powerful and pervasive
capability across healthcare technologies. It is changing the game for clinical and administrative
processes as well as creating new ethical quandaries. New business and operating models are
emerging to address increasing demand and escalating costs for medical and health services.
Ecosystem roles are evolving as new competitive fronts are redefining relationships among
participants, forcing the convergence of previously siloed lines of business and industry sectors.
To compete and succeed amid uncertainty and rapid change, healthcare industry leaders must
respond to — and embrace — disruption and confront major common challenges. In annual reports
and trade publications, CEOs across sectors are evangelizing digital and innovation initiatives as
strategic imperatives to seize the opportunities of disruption and overcome challenges.

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To deliver on these priorities, CIOs must adopt a “digital first” mindset. This means adapting to
pervasive change, anticipating disruptions, creating an adaptable IT organization and culture, and
making the right investments in a timely fashion. To do all this, CIOs and IT leaders must make
strategic decisions that enhance service delivery models, core value delivery approaches and
underlying competencies. These decisions, in turn, will affect leadership, cultures, business models,
organizational structures, skills, processes and technologies. The transformation that customers
demand requires technology to enable new business models and break through the barriers to
change.
Topics
Every CIO must play a leading role in identifying, preparing for and navigating future challenges
and opportunities of the healthcare ecosystem. Understanding macro-level industry trends and
their implications, and using them to influence short-term and long-term investments and
strategies, will enable CIOs to successfully lead their organizations’ digital transformation
initiatives to maximum impact.
Our research supports CIOs and IT leaders as they prepare their organizations for the major in-
progress and emerging changes. CIOs who use Gartner’s healthcare industry research and advice
will be able to accelerate and amplify the benefits of digitalization across the healthcare
landscape. They also will be better prepared to lead amid the market and technology changes that
are driving their business priorities. They will be able to act quickly on opportunities to exploit
digital technologies, focusing on prospects that are relevant to their business priorities and have
the potential for high impact.
Our research in this area addresses the following topics:
Advanced Intelligence and Insight: Data Curation, AI, Analytics Strategy
This core topic covers strategies, technologies and practices to successfully apply data, analytics
and AI to achieve critical outcomes and business objectives across the healthcare and life science
industries. The research provides guidance to help deliver the highest value from data and
analytics investments. It defines solutions across analytics tools, technologies, vendors and
architecture, and encompasses foundational competencies, best practices, industry use cases,
innovation and emerging analytics techniques.
Questions Your Peers Are Asking
Recommended Content
Some recommended content may not be available as part of your current Gartner subscription.
How can I develop advanced analytics capabilities (AI, data curation and management, skills) to
discover and unleash value from healthcare and life science data?
■
“Gartner Healthcare Analytics Framework for Healthcare CIOs”
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Planned Research
Digital Strategy: Digital Business, Industry Platform Models, IT Strategy
This core topic dives deeply into the IT implications of industry dynamics and provides an
understanding of how healthcare organizations should leverage technology to support innovative
and transformative healthcare industry models. It helps develop a strategy that fits the context of
the changing industry, as well as the business priorities and implications of the industry’s business
drivers.
Questions Your Peers Are Asking
Recommended Content
Some recommended content may not be available as part of your current Gartner subscription.
“Progress in Healthcare Analytics Lies in Leveraging Data”
■
“Emerging Applications of AI for Healthcare Providers”
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“Healthcare Provider CIOs: Get Ahead of AI Innovation With Strong AI Governance”
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“Healthcare’s Digital Data Dexterity Demands a Data Curation and Enrichment Hub”
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“Drive a New Data and Analytics Architecture to Match Your Digital Healthcare Provider Needs”
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Top innovations and advancements in healthcare analytics and AI as well as their value
propositions
■
Strategies to create a data-driven culture and elevate organizationwide analytic literacy
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Support for the development and implementation of analytics strategies, and building
competencies essential to sustaining the value contribution of data-driven insights
■
Insights into the organization, skills and key competencies needed to deliver effective results
from analytics
■
How can I align digital and IT strategies to support my organization’s critical business
imperatives?
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“2020 CIO Agenda: A Healthcare Payer Perspective”
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“2020 CIO Agenda: A Healthcare Provider’s Perspective”
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“Emerging Digital Health Business Models Create the Need for Open Ecosystem IT Platforms”
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“Best Practices for Reimagining Your Life Sciences Company as a Digital Business Technology
Platform”
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Planned Research
Industry Dynamics: Trends, Business and Operating Models, Innovation
This core topic references global patterns, policies and shifting dynamics that are shaping the
healthcare of the future. It addresses the market forces and drivers that influence technology
decisions including social, economic, political, environmental and technology patterns, and their
influence on healthcare and, most specifically, on healthcare transformation. The core topic
includes predictions, business drivers and technology innovation trends.
Questions Your Peers Are Asking
Recommended Content
Some recommended content may not be available as part of your current Gartner subscription.
“How CIOs Can Build Six Key Competencies to Advance Healthcare Ecosystem Orchestration
Ability”
■
Digital business, platform and IT strategy creation and alignment with organizational, mission-
critical priorities and objectives
■
Insights into digital strategies and capabilities to create new value, including innovative use
cases and best practices for deployment
■
Roadmaps for navigating the transformational digital journey, including survey-based insight on
industry progress
■
Frameworks and Toolkits for applying digital business, digital optimization and transformation
in the healthcare and life science industries, inclusive of platforms, digital key performance
indicators (KPIs) and alignment with organizational priorities
■
What are the innovations, trends, and forces that are shaping the future business and operating
models of the healthcare and life science industries?
■
“Business Drivers of Technology Decisions for Healthcare Payers, 2020”
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“Business Drivers of Technology Decisions for Healthcare Providers, 2020”
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“Business Drivers of Technology Decisions for Life Science Organizations, 2020”
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“Healthcare Payer CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends”
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“Healthcare Provider CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends”
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“Life Science CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends”
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Planned Research
Suggested First Steps
“Predicts 2020: Healthcare Providers Must Strike a Balance for Digital Business Success”
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“Predicts 2020: U.S. Healthcare Payers Put Emerging Technologies at Center Stage”
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“Predicts 2020: Life Science CIOs Must Digitalize for Business Growth”
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“Cool Vendors in Healthcare Artificial Intelligence”
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“Cool Vendors in Digital Business Transformation in Healthcare”
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Identify market forces and drivers that influence technology decisions including social,
economic, political, environmental and technology patterns
■
Assess future challenges and opportunities via predictions, technology innovation trends,
business drivers and priorities, and implications for the healthcare industry
■
Explore new and emerging business and operating models
■
Insights into customer, peer, vendor and consumer actions and attitudes to reinforce the urgency
and direction of change
■
Hype Cycles for major industry sectors (that is, providers, U.S. payers and life sciences)
■
Assess emerging and disruptive technologies, such as those seen in Cool Vendor profiles
■
Attend a Gartner IT Symposium/Xpo event. Attend industry and core technology sessions and
meet with analysts and peers to glean insights about business and technology trends affecting
healthcare and life sciences.
■
Attend the Data & Analytics Summit. Attend industry and core technology sessions and meet
with analysts and peers to develop and refine data and analytics strategies and best practices.
■
“A CIO’s Hype Cycle Reference Guide for the Healthcare and Life Science Industries” — This Hype
Cycle provides an orientation tool for industry-specific and other Hype Cycles and technologies
highly relevant to the needs of healthcare and life science CIOs, who must navigate numerous
unique industry technology sets.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trend: Advancing Medical Science” — This research provides insight on
how medical science advancement is driven by trends, such as digitalization, Internet of Things
(IoT) analytics, AI or machine learning (ML) capabilities, manufacturing and prototyping
methods, understanding patient behaviors and treatment modalities, and new data sources.
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Essential Reading
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Managing a Health Ecosystem” — This research provides
guidance on how the healthcare and life science industries’ massive shift to value-based care
and consumer centricity has accelerated the reformation of business ecosystems to reflect the
consumer’s comprehensive health and healthcare needs.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Transforming Care Delivery” — This research provides insight on
how precision and genomic medicine, real-time clinical operation, virtual care, population health
and care pathway orchestration platforms are emerging and converging to form hyperconnected
digital services and smart infrastructure as a new healthcare delivery model.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Reinventing Hospital Operations and Administration” — This
research offers guidance to provider CIOs to optimize and transform clinical and administrative
operations that contribute key performance measures, patient satisfaction, and retention and
revenue objectives and growth. This can be accomplished by identifying and deploying
technologies that eliminate latency and waste, optimizing costs, increasing staff and resource
utilization, and leveraging economies of scale and innovation.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Administrating Ecosystem Efficiency” — This research provides
insight on how administration is essential to the operation of healthcare and life science
organizations and instrumental to the delivery of treatments to consumers through transacting
money, exchanging information, providing incentives, managing care, monitoring safety and
improving quality.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Bridging Consumers’ Engagement Gap With Their Health” — This
research focuses on the importance of improving consumer engagement within all industry
segments as they continue to accelerate year-over-year investments in consumer engagement
solutions.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Creating a New Era of Insight-Driven Healthcare” — This research
offers insight into rapid innovation across all sectors of the industry (providers, payers and life
sciences) characterized by pervasive digital representation of clinical and operational
environments and the means to drive insights from the data using AI.
■
“Healthcare Innovation Trends: Bending the Healthcare Cost Curve” — This research focuses on
how healthcare and life science organizations that are continually under pressure from
governments, private payers and consumers can control product and service costs while
simultaneously enhancing the quality of care to improve health outcomes.
■
“A CIO’s Hype Cycle Reference Guide for the Healthcare and Life Science Industries” — This
guide provides an orientation tool for industry-specific and other Hype Cycles and technologies
highly relevant to the needs of healthcare and life science CIOs.
■

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Recommended For You
Healthcare Innovation Trend: Advancing Medical Science
Healthcare Innovation Trends: Bridging Consumers’ Engagement Gap With Their Health
Healthcare Innovation Trends: Reinventing Hospital Operations and Administration
Healthcare Innovation Trends: Administrating Ecosystem Efficiency
A CIO’s Hype Cycle Reference Guide for the Healthcare and Life Science Industries
“Hype Cycle for Healthcare Providers, 2019” — This Hype Cycle tracks the most significant IT
directions in applications, analytics and systems relevant to the healthcare provider enterprise.
The implications impact health outcomes.
■
“Hype Cycle for U.S. Healthcare Payers, 2019” — This Hype Cycle provides critical input for
strategic planning by tracking the maturity levels and adoption rates of emerging payer
technologies and approaches. U.S. healthcare payer CIOs should use this research to plan their
investments to optimize and transform.
■
“Hype Cycle for Life Science Research and Development, 2019” — This Hype Cycle identifies
innovation opportunities, creates value and cements a place in the healthcare ecosystem for life
science CIOs, who are now implementing their organizations’ digital R&D vision and leveraging
technologies to efficiently develop drugs, devices and digital therapies.
■
“Hype Cycle for Life Science Commercial Operations, 2019” — This Hype Cycle provides
guidance to CIOs to assess and implement emerging technologies to deliver transformation, in
conjunction with CEOs, to address accelerating medical innovation, emboldened payers,
frustrated patients and digital disruptors.
■
“Healthcare Provider CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends” — This guide
helps healthcare provider CIOs inform their digital investment strategy and avoid obsolescence,
as well as revealing technology innovations that can confront major challenges of the industry
and enable transformative change.
■
“Healthcare Payer CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends” — This guide
provides information on how CIOs should prioritize investment in accelerating digitalization
initiatives in response to the looming threat of disruption by new market entrants and regulation
to enable growth and help their organization avoid obsolescence.
■
“Life Science CIO Guide to the Industry’s Technology Innovation Trends” — This guide informs
life science CIO digital investment strategies in response to disruptive business forces, such as
medical and technology innovation and a changing definition of value.
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