Continued march toward medical superintelligence: In 2026, healthcare AI moves even closer to medical superintelligence. Last year, multiple models posted near-perfect USMLE scores and outperformed the average physician on several benchmarks (ex: here). With NVIDIA’s Blackwell and Google’s TPU next-generation chip infrastructure coming online and scaling laws still holding, performance makes another jump across diagnostics, decision support, and real clinical workflows.

The rise of proactive health consumers: In 2026, a small but growing healthcare segment gains momentum as people take greater ownership of their health, driven by shifting sentiment and better technology. Momentum is visible in fast-growing preventive health startups (ex. Function Health reportedly past $100M ARR in Feb 2025) and emerging policy conversations (ex. MAHA movement). As wearables, routine blood testing, accessible preventive scans, and AI-powered insights go mainstream, individuals gain more visibility and ownership of their health. This shift fuels healthier living, recurring engagement, and a prevention-first model that reshapes healthcare and adjacent industries. New innovative companies will continue to come online in this space in 2026 (ex. Nestwell).

From point tools to AI platforms: In 2026, healthcare AI shifts from fragmented point solutions to integrated platforms that quietly power clinical, operational, and financial workflows. Enterprise buyers demand consolidation and seek AI that orchestrates these domains end-to-end. This is visible in health AI startup land as scribe companies like Abridge, Ambience, and Nabla are expanding beyond their initial wedges, players such as Commure/Athelas pursue acquisitions to cover the full spread or, like our next story, New Mountain Capital is looking to create a massive merged PE play, and incumbents like Epic roll out native AI tools. The winners feel less like tools and more like infrastructure.

Evals become the strategic engine: In 2026, AI evaluations move from a backroom checkbox to a core strategic capability, with governance built around them. Momentum was already building last year as OpenAI, Microsoft, Mercor, Stanford, Lumos AI, and more released healthcare-specific benchmarks. That trend accelerates as transparency and quality become essential for adoption. Health systems formalize multidisciplinary governance to assess performance, drift, risk, and real-world outcomes. Startups like Qualified Health, Arize AI, and others have been popping up to fill these gaps and bodies like URAC and CTA will continue to release standards. Strong evals become the unlock for safely scaling AI across clinical and operational care.

The context layer comes to healthcare AI: In 2026, AI moves beyond documentation and transcription to become a true context layer for care delivery. Systems increasingly unify clinical data, payer rules, health system knowledge, and medical literature in real time. Ambient AI prepares charts before visits, flags coverage and authorization requirements during encounters, suggests orders or next steps, and generates clear follow-up summaries. The result is less administrative friction, better clinical decisions in the moment, and more time for clinicians to focus on patients, with much more context.

Diagnosis in your pocket: In 2026, AI-powered second opinions become mainstream as patients increasingly turn to tools like ChatGPT to interpret symptoms, scans, and medical decisions. More than 40 million people already use ChatGPT daily for health questions, often outside clinic hours. Examples like recently a Redditor feeding his MRI into ChatGPT and it correctly identified the cause of his sciatic leg pain are becoming quite common. While not a replacement for clinicians, AI increasingly helps patients catch missed issues, navigate care, and decide when to seek help.

Change management as the edge: As AI platforms reshape healthcare, the real advantage lies in execution. Because healthcare is still run by humans and human workflows, outcomes depend on how well new tools are integrated into daily practice. Teams without deeply entrenched workflows move faster, while established organizations only win if they are willing to drive change from the top. In 2026, success depends less on the best AI and more on removing friction, realigning incentives, and actually changing how work gets done.

Doximity adds physician review to DoxGPT outputs: Doximity announced PeerCheck, a feature that embeds physician review directly into AI-generated answers within DoxGPT to improve trust and governance in clinical AI. (link)

Wellstar spins out Polysight to automate regulatory compliance: Wellstar Health System launched Polysight, an AI startup using agentic LLMs to track and interpret regulatory changes in real time. The company raised $1M in preseed funding and is being piloted across Wellstar’s hospitals. (link)

Included Health launches AI assistant for members: Included Health rolled out an intelligent AI assistant to help members navigate benefits, access care, and get personalized guidance across its healthcare services. (link)

IQVIA introduces Med-R1 research agent: IQVIA unveiled Med-R1, an AI research agent designed to support deep clinical and scientific analysis by synthesizing medical literature and real-world data. (link)

b.well launches SDK for health AI agents: b.well Connected Health introduced an SDK that lets organizations build AI agents with access to 2.2M providers, 300+ health plans, and integrated pharmacy, lab, and device data to support personalized actions like scheduling and prescription transfers. (link)

Linus Health study supports digital biomarker for Alzheimer’s: Research from Mass General and the Harvard Aging Brain Study found Linus Health’s three-minute AI cognitive test can detect early Alzheimer’s signals through speech and drawing behavior. (link)

General Medicine links AI health chats with clinical care: General Medicine launched an AI tool that collects a patient’s health history, supports structured symptom discussions, and connects conversations directly to scheduling and clinician review before visits. (link)

Kontakt.io launches Access Agent for outpatient clinics: Kontakt.io introduced an AI agent that uses real-time location and EHR data to optimize exam room assignments, forecast availability, and unlock outpatient capacity without adding rooms. (link)

Infinitus expands AI agents into clinical support: Infinitus added new clinical AI agents focused on patient education, care management guidance, and health risk assessments to its contact center platform. (link)

Nabla + Advanced Machine Intelligence: Nabla formed a strategic research partnership with Advanced Machine Intelligence to advance next-generation AI models that complement LLMs for clinical use. The collaboration provides Nabla early access to new model architectures as it expands its AI research efforts. (link)

Develop Health + athenahealth: Develop Health is now embedded in athenaOne, automating benefits verification and prior authorization with real-time approvals returned to the patient chart. (link)

Fisher-Titus Medical Center + Luma Health: Fisher-Titus is rolling out Luma’s patient access platform across 17 departments, expanding self-scheduling, waitlists, and SMS engagement ahead of a systemwide rollout. (link)

Cedars-Sinai + University Health Network: Cedars-Sinai and University Health Network partnered to advance AI research and clinical applications across their health systems. (link)

Baptist Health Arkansas + Amazon: Baptist Health Arkansas adopted Amazon AI tools to support clinical and operational workflows across the system. (link)

Tebra + DrFirst: Tebra launched a medication adherence program powered by DrFirst’s RxInform, integrated into the Tebra EHR+ platform for independent practices. (link)

Cleveland Clinic + Akasa: Cleveland Clinic is using Akasa to automate routine medical coding within mid-revenue cycle workflows. (link)

Mass General Brigham + Dana-Farber: Mass General Brigham and Dana-Farber are developing an AI model to improve cancer prognosis and treatment planning. (link)

WellSpan Health + Aidoc: WellSpan Health scaled Aidoc’s AI operating system across nine hospitals to support imaging workflows and clinical decision-making. (link)

Horizon Health Network + Qure.ai: Horizon Health Network partnered with Qure.ai to implement an AI lung cancer care suite ahead of a province-wide screening program. (link)

Wellstar + Polysight: Wellstar’s venture arm launched Polysight, an AI compliance intelligence company focused on regulatory monitoring and workflow support. (link)

Tampa General Hospital Cancer Institute + Reimagine Care: Tampa General selected Reimagine Care’s AI-enabled virtual oncology platform to expand capacity and improve cancer care delivery. (link)

Tebra, the private healthcare platform, closed $250M in new equity and debt financing to accelerate its R&D in AI and automation. The financing consists primarily of equity capital led by Hildred, as well as a debt facility provided by J.P. Morgan. (link)

Chai Discovery, an SF-based developer of AI-designed molecules, raised $130M in Series B funding. Oak HC/FT and General Catalyst led, joined by Thrive Capital, OpenAI, Dimension, Menlo Ventures, Lachy Groom, Yosemite, Neo, SV Angel, Emerson Collective, and Glade Brook. (link)

Neurable, a Boston-based developer of brain-computer interface AI, raised $35M in Series A funding led by Spectrum Moonshot Fund. (link)

Codoxo, a Duluth, Ga.-based health payment integrity startup, raised $35M in Series C funding. CVS Health Ventures led, joined by Echo Health Ventures and insiders Sands Capital Management and 450 Ventures. (link)

Valerie Health, a Lafayette, Calif., developer of "AI front offices" for physicians, raised $30M in Series A funding. Redpoint Ventures led, joined by General Catalyst, Primary Ventures, BoxGroup, Karman Ventures, .406 Ventures, and Waybury Capital. (link)

Drive Health, a Gilbert, Ariz.-based clinical agent developer, raised $15M. Vitalis Ventures led, joined by Inside Capital Partners. (link)

Leona Health, a Mexico City-based AI copilot for doctors on WhatsApp, raised $14M in seed funding. A16z led, joined by General Catalyst and Accel. (link)

Mindoo, a platform for deploying agentic workflows in European healthcare, raised €5M in seed funding from 6DC and Syndicate One. (link)

HHS seeks input on accelerating clinical AI adoption (link)

Medicare backs AI heart scans before proof of benefit (link)

Hospitals remain cautious on fully autonomous AI (link)

Will your next surgeon be a human or a robot? (link)