Around the world, populations are getting older, and their health needs are becoming more complex. At the same time, technological advances are changing healthcare delivery. In this edition, The Next Normal explores how hospitals will innovate in the coming decade—and what it will mean for both patients and healthcare professionals.

In upcoming editions, The Next Normal will explore the future of grocery, college, video entertainment, and more.

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More on the future of hospital care

Podcast

Fit for the future: The common challenges facing healthcare systems—and how to meet them
– Across the developed world, health systems must adapt to aging populations, changing patient needs, and advances in technology... that could both reduce costs and revolutionize clinical care.
Article

Promoting an overdue digital transformation in healthcare
– Research from over 30 countries offers insight into providing digital healthcare, including practical steps for key stakeholders.
Article

The era of exponential improvement in healthcare?
– Technology-driven innovation holds the potential to improve our understanding of patients, enable the delivery of more convenient,... individualized care—and create $350 billion–$410 billion in annual value by 2025.
Article

Healthcare consumerism today: Accelerating the consumer experience
– McKinsey’s latest research shows that consumer engagement in healthcare continues to grow, but many payers and providers... are struggling to meet changing needs and demands.
Executive Briefing

The productivity imperative for healthcare delivery in the United States
– Healthcare is a key component of the US economy, but healthcare spending increases consistently outstrip GDP growth. Improving... productivity in healthcare delivery could change this dynamic without harming patient care.
Article

Five trends shaping the future of Medicaid
– The Medicaid program has experienced significant changes since 2010, when the Affordable Care Act was passed. Five trends are... likely to affect how the program will change over the next five to ten years.
Article

Natural language processing in healthcare
– Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly being adopted across the healthcare industry, and some of the most exciting AI applications... leverage natural language processing (NLP). Simply put, NLP is a specialized branch of AI focused on the interpretation and manipulation of human-generated spoken or written data. In this infographic, we describe a few promising NLP use cases for healthcare payers and providers. We elaborate several specific approaches and their associated applications. Finally, we lay out a case study describing how we have used NLP to accelerate benchmarking clinical guidelines.
Article

The future of healthcare: Finding the opportunities that lie beneath the uncertainty
– Healthcare is a dynamic industry with significant opportunity, but cost concerns, uncertainty, and complexity can also make it... an unnerving one. Substantial upside exists for players that can deliver value-creating solutions and thrive under uncertainty.

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