For much of the last decade, health systems have treated digital progress as a visibility problem. They thought the remedy was more features, more access points and more reminders that a portal or app is available.
Now, a growing number of digital health and informatics leaders are pushing back on that mindset, believing the best digital patient experience is one patients never notice. IT leaders across health systems are redefining what “excellent” means: it is not adoption, satisfaction scores or the number of services available online. It is invisibility.
“Patients don’t experience ‘digital,’” said Richard Zane, MD, chief medical and innovation officer for UCHealth in Aurora, Colo. “They experience care. Digital is just one of the tools like a [surgical] robot, scalpel, exam rooms, IV pumps, or clinicians themselves that we use to deliver that care. When it works well, it disappears. When it doesn’t, it’s all everyone notices.”
Virtual assistants should feel like continuation of care and ambient documentation can give clinicians the opportunity to more directly interact with patients. That’s what makes the difference – being able to dig deeper into the humanity of healthcare.
Yasir Tarabichi, MD, chief health AI officer for MetroHealth System in Cleveland, reduces the thesis to a single sentence: “An excellent digital patient experience is one where the technology disappears and what’s left is timely, coordinated and trustworthy care.”
MetroHealth has embarked on a variety of technology-driven patient experience initiatives, including virtual care and human-centered training for the team. The health system is also planning to deploy smart technology at 500 patient rooms at five of its hospitals, adding Artisight’s virtual nursing, virtual sitting and AI-powered fall monitoring and voice command capabilities.
Danny Lee, MD, chief medical informatics officer for Johns Hopkins Medicine in Baltimore, frames the standard as what patients feel rather than what technology does. Excellent digital experience means meeting patients where they already are — on a smartphone, in a patient portal or through a messaging thread — without requiring them to navigate complexity for simple answers.
“Above all, it requires that the technology stay invisible,” Dr. Lee said. “When digital tools work well, patients just feel heard and cared for, not processed.”
The invisibility threshold runs counter to several ingrained institutional behaviors. Health systems that have spent years building digital infrastructure face pressure to make that investment legible and to showcase the portal, promote the app and count telehealth encounters.
The invisibility argument implies the opposite because the endpoint is a patient who never consciously engaged with a piece of technology at all.
Vitaly Herasevich, MD, PhD, professor of anesthesiology and medicine and co-director of the Center for Clinical and Translational Science Office of Digital Innovation for Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., said his goal is to shift the patient’s fundamental orientation toward the experience itself.
“An excellent digital patient experience is multimodal and cannot be defined by a single element,” he said. “First and most importantly, an app or portal should be created to solve a real problem that exists. This applies to both its purpose and its functionality.”
There have to be minimal or no steps, forms or confusing navigation to optimize usability. Patients also need context for reading data and interpreting notes, and it should be easy for them to reach a human when desired.
Mayo Clinic is taking things a step further.
In 2024, the Rochester, Minn.-based system embarked on a multiyear, $5 billion project to redevelop its flagship hospital to be fully digitized and optimized for the patient experience. When it was announced, the health system leaders said they didn’t want the new campus to be considered a hospital, but rather one stop on a continuous care journey including virtual, inpatient, outpatient and home care.
“An excellent digital patient experience feels less like ‘using a healthcare system’ and more like ‘being guided through care without obstacles’,” Dr. Herasevich said.
At the Becker's 11th Annual IT + Revenue Cycle Conference: The Future of AI & Digital Health, taking place September 14–17 in Chicago, healthcare executives and digital leaders from across the country will come together to explore how AI, interoperability, cybersecurity, and revenue cycle innovation are transforming care delivery, strengthening financial performance, and driving the next era of digital health. Apply for complimentary registration now.