How next-generation AI and digital tools are transforming healthcare

In the midst of an ever-evolving healthcare industry with mounting demands, healthcare frontline workers have emerged as true champions helping to carry the industry forward. This year has been a whirlwind of challenges and uncertainties, but these remarkable individuals continue to display unwavering flexibility and perseverance. They stand at the forefront of patient care, skillfully navigating the changing landscape of the industry.

As healthcare providers continue to face a complex mix of challenges, including severe financial strain, increasing competition, clinician burnout, and workforce shortages, the need to improve outcomes by using information and technology to enable quality care is stronger than ever.

Amidst rapid change, the healthcare sector is embracing adaptability and resilience. Facilities are rethinking their approaches and harnessing innovative technologies and digital tools to streamline processes and empower healthcare teams to provide exceptional care. Their ability to adapt in the face of adversity is nothing short of inspiring. It has enabled healthcare providers to maintain a high level of service despite the most demanding circumstances.

Providers must also capitalize on digital technologies to help improve operational efficiencies, quality of care, and patient satisfaction and retention, as well as optimize revenue cycle management.

Tools like Microsoft Teams play a pivotal role in the transformative journey in healthcare. For example, healthcare workers are using Teams as their communications and collaboration hub, facilitating virtual video visits and keeping care teams connected. We’ve seen strong and consistent double-digit growth in frontline workers’ monthly active users of Microsoft Teams in the healthcare industry this year. This highlights the crucial role digital tools play in shaping the future of healthcare, fostering seamless operations, collaboration, and the exchange of vital health information.

Enhancing operational efficiency in healthcare with AI and digital tools

Between fluctuating team schedules and staying up to date with their often large and dispersed healthcare teams—from physicians to phlebotomists—maintaining end-to-end visibility on operations can get time-consuming for managers. But today’s digital tools, including AI, are reshaping the healthcare teams and support staff work.

Lightening the load for frontline healthcare managers

It’s often a complex task for care team managers to quickly identify open items to address throughout the week such as open shifts and ad hoc, time-specific work. Using chat history, shifts data, and more, Microsoft 365 Copilot helps managers improve operational and healthcare outcomes by quickly getting an AI-powered list of important action items specific to their care team and location.

Managers can identify open items such as open shifts that need to be covered with a new Shifts plugin for Microsoft 365 Copilot. Soon, Microsoft 365 Copilot can ground prompts and retrieve insights for frontline healthcare managers leveraging data from the Shifts app in addition to user and company data it has access to such as Teams chat history, SharePoint, emails, and more.  

Enhancing care team coordination and collaboration

Communication within the healthcare chain is evolving, transcending isolated pockets, and embracing a connected ecosystem. Real-time information exchange has become the norm, showcasing the industry’s determination to remain cohesive and collaborative. This connectedness empowers healthcare professionals to make informed decisions swiftly, and enhances patient outcomes and overall care delivery.

Ease of communication

When using the hotline feature on Teams certified phone devices, care teams can simplify and help secure contact management to always reach the right colleague or patient over calling. Devices can now be programmed to directly dial pre-configured hotline phone numbers or contacts, such as a provider’s emergency services, help deck, or security desk.

Leveraging modern communications to connect providers across health systems

Effective organization-wide communication from health providers main headquarters is essential to the success of its care teams, yet getting the right message to the right people can be challenging. Now, Announcements in Viva Connections lets corporate teams deliver communications and create notifications for clinicians and care teams within the home experience of Teams.

To reduce communication overload and help healthcare workers focus on what’s most relevant to them and their patients, organizational leaders can now target important communications like urgent announcements, role-specific updates, and safety policy changes to care teams and other frontline workers with Announcements in Viva Connections. With these new features, important messages are now delivered through push notifications and communications that surface in the home experience within Teams, where healthcare workers often start their day. Announcements are coming to tablet and mobile experiences in September 2023, with desktop experiences coming later this year.

To enhance the home experience in Teams for healthcare with frontline workers who span multiple sites or locations, we are excited to announce that a provider can now have multiple experiences. This new feature allows organizations to provide a tailored experience that reflects each location’s look and feel and customize the dashboard for each location’s unique needs. Multiple home experiences are now available through the Viva Connections app in Teams. Learn more about the recent enhancements to home experiences in Teams.

Drive engagement with campaign targeting

It’s important for providers to be able to target frontline care teams and drive engagement around their organization’s mission and core priorities. With new Targeted Campaigns in Viva Engage, you can now select specific audiences to reach with targeted communication campaigns and initiatives—perfect for scenarios like safety campaigns, policy changes, and other initiatives where you want to get the word out to employees and get people involved.

Personalize workplace communication with generative AI

Copilot in Microsoft Viva Engage helps healthcare leaders create compelling and inspiring posts from simple prompts or trending topics within workplace communities and storyline conversations. Corporate communicators can receive suggestions to further personalize messages, adjust tone and length, and even suggest relevant images to help drive great engagement on the frontline. Leaders can also utilize Copilot to analyze engagement metrics, assess sentiment, and recommend responses. Learn more about Copilot in Viva, coming later this year.

Providing trusted experiences to support health teams

Healthcare providers are committed to improving the work experience of their frontline workforce. They are investing in creating secure, user-friendly environments, reflecting their forward-thinking mindset and dedication to supporting their staff. They recognize that adaptability and progress are intrinsically tied to the people who make healthcare possible, ensuring a sustainable and fulfilling future.

Simplifying digital identity and personal workspaces

You can now provide your healthcare workers with a digital identity and personalized workspace that allows them to seamlessly access what they need to do their work without context switching, no matter the device or ecosystem. With personalized device experiences, care teams can spend less time logging in and out with intuitive experiences that make it easy to be more secure. Frontline healthcare workers can simply and quickly sign in and out of shared devices.

With Windows 365 Frontline, shift and part-time workers can unlock the power of Cloud PCs, allowing them to securely access their personalized Windows experience on any device. Instead of the common hassles that come with sharing physical PCs, Windows 365 Frontline provides personalized Cloud PCs, enabling your frontline employees to work from anywhere, ultimately helping to boost their productivity and job satisfaction. 

When workers log on, they have immediate access to their personalized apps, desktops, data, and settings, so they can pick up where they left off, regardless of their device or location. Integration with Microsoft Entra ID (formerly Azure Active Directory) and Microsoft Intune makes it easy to configure, deploy, manage, and secure your Cloud PCs, enabling you to maximize existing technology resources to meet the needs of all your employees. Windows 365 Frontline is now generally available. Read the announcement blog or contact sales to learn more.

Equip the healthcare industry with Microsoft solutions

In the delicate balance between adaptability and perseverance, the healthcare industry forges a path towards a promising future. Embracing new operational efficiencies, leveraging enhanced communications and connectivity, and fostering a secure work experience are pivotal elements of this journey. The unwavering spirit and commitment of healthcare workers drive these transformative shifts, enabling the industry to provide exceptional care while navigating the complexities of a changing landscape.

Whether it’s improving communication between care team members or enhancing provider operations with AI, Microsoft has solutions to equip frontline healthcare workers to meet new and evolving industry demands.  

• Connect with an expert to learn more about Microsoft frontline solutions.
• Discover how you can connect your customers, your people, and your data with Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare.
• Explore additional Microsoft Teams frontline solutions for healthcare.
• Learn more about Microsoft’s next-generation AI set to transform the frontline.