Health systems have generally found success with interoperability among medical devices, electronic health records and other IT platforms.
Still, providers have been slower to adopt some of these technologies than expected, hindering wider successes with improving patient outcomes, according to new research from Deloitte Center for Health Solutions.
But if medical device companies were to work more closely with providers and health IT vendors to address specific pain points, adoption of connected care could increase, researchers said.
WHY IT MATTERS
Health systems want "robust evidence of real-world effectiveness and financial viability" of the medical devices and technologies they invest in, said Deloitte researchers in the new report, published Wednesday.
The research paints a rosy picture of a healthcare ecosystem where, for example, surgeons are routinely served by automations that adjust their surroundings to their preferences – where they can administer medications during surgery based on real-time patient vital signs and can analyze data to provide critical insights.
But so far many providers are taking a more measured and cautious approach to adopting leading-edge technologies, the Deloitte researchers said.
Deloitte gathered responses from 50 senior tech executives and 50 healthcare leaders working in IT and procurement roles via survey in December 2024 and January 2025, followed by five in-depth interviews with respondents.
They found key areas where the two groups' expectations aligned and diverged.
Healthcare executives largely acknowledged the potential clinical value of using internet of things technologies (84%), but cited three chief challenges: demonstrating end-user value (32%), integration with existing workflows (29%) and budget constraints (27%).
Overall, 92% of provider IT leaders said that integrating connected devices into existing data systems caused the most friction and was moderately to extremely complex.
Further segmentation of the provider group revealed that finance and procurement leaders identified reimbursement (20%), end-user value (16%) and budget (16%) as challenges to connected care adoption while IT respondents cited lack of interoperability (17%), workflow integration (17%) and demonstrating end-user value (16%) as the main challenges for their organizations.
The survey findings showed that many medical device companies misunderstand the severity of these challenges providers face. Nearly half of the tech executive respondents cited a lack of interoperability with electronic health records (45%), followed by data privacy and security concerns (32%).
Similar to the healthcare executive respondents, about a third (31%) also cited difficulties in integrating with existing workflows. The gap in data integration is "particularly significant and may be the central or most critical factor" the other challenges are dependent upon, researchers said.
"When medical devices can’t seamlessly communicate with each other, integrating useful insights into healthcare workflows becomes difficult," they said. "This tends to lead to lower adoption by providers, resulting in limited real-world evidence of the technologies’ clinical and operational benefits."
Deloitte advised medical device companies to work with providers, patients and other health tech vendors to collect real-world evidence to quantify the value of connected care, focus product development on providers' end users and IT strategies, and build resilient security architectures and governance structures for use.
THE LARGER TREND
With investments in connected care technologies growing over the past few years, IoT devices have expanded telehealth's potential and are beginning to transform care by advancing remote patient monitoring and hospital-at-home initiatives.
By continuously monitoring patients, IoT devices have been shown to reduce in-person visits and better manage chronic diseases, like diabetes, said Chris Baird, CEO of OptConnect, which provides tech platforms for several healthcare use cases.
But data collected from RPM devices may not integrate with EHRs or other clinical systems, "complicating care coordination and patient management," as Baird told Healthcare IT News this past November.
"Investing in updated IT infrastructure and ensuring IoT devices can work with different systems is a challenge healthcare providers must address to fully leverage the benefits of IoT in patient care," he said.
Baird also acknowledged that while connected care devices might lead to long-term cost savings for healthcare organizations, initial investments are "substantial" for them.
ON THE RECORD
"To help meet provider needs for end-user value and workflow integration, medtech companies will likely need to focus more on the interoperability of their devices, both within their suite of solutions and with other products in the market," said Deloitte health researchers in the new report.
Andrea Fox is senior editor of Healthcare IT News.
Email: afox@himss.org
Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS Media publication.
