2025 Predictions vs. Reality: A Mid-Year Check-In

Healthcare Supply Chain Stakeholders Will Navigate a Fragility Crisis That Demands Resiliency Breakthroughs

The resiliency crisis is real and present in 2025. Ongoing challenges include narrow operating margins for hospitals (with costs rising higher than inflation) and external threats to suppliers, such as natural disasters and geopolitical unrest. Earlier this year, we predicted that the healthcare supply chain would prove susceptible to these and other challenges, resulting in a fragility crisis. Unfortunately, this prediction has proven accurate in ways that highlight the challenges we will still face in the months ahead.

• Geopolitical conflicts are introducing shipping disruptions, prompting a rethink of regional sourcing. The 2025 Global Report, by the World Economic Forum, suggests that state-based armed conflict, including proxy wars, civil wars, coups and terrorism, is identified as the top risk for 2025, with 23% of respondents viewing it as the most pressing threat.
• Hospitals are grappling with an uncertain regulatory landscape.
• Wildfires and floods are interrupting supply flows.

The result of these pressures is a very real impact on the healthcare supply chain. The GHX Community has assessed that it may be as high as 1.5% of total supply cost when factoring in impact from costs, logistics and labor. Those investing in analytics, diversification and AI are working to better position themselves to advance, while others remain behind.

Our recommendation

Act now or risk being unprepared. Begin thinking about how to apply forward-thinking, such as proactive substitution management, not just reactionary thinking, to your processes.

Artificial Intelligence Will Transition from Experimentation to Execution

We predicted that 2025 would prove out AI in various ways, with many organizations adopting AI solutions to improve their resiliency stance. According to GHX Chief Product Officer Archie Mayani, "2025 will be a transformative year for healthcare. AI will move from experimentation to execution, with providers and manufacturers using it to personalize patient care, optimize supply chains and advance precision medicine at scale."

As of now, we still have more questions than answers about AI. Rather than a clear shift from proof-of-concept to targeted, high-value AI use cases in areas like forecasting, exception handling, and price management, organizations are struggling to go from pilot to solutions, but the leaders are leaning in to solve the questions with an eye towards real ROI.

• AI pilots are focusing on demand forecasting and exception detection, but only at the most sophisticated organizations. “Last year, AI was a buzzword. This year, it’s still a buzzword, but it’s very real,” says Rich Scarfo, president of HLTH.
• AI adoption is concentrated where data systems are mature. “To achieve optimal results, they need strong data governance, data quality, privacy and security measures, and proper staff training,” say CDW Healthcare Strategists Lee Pierce and Ben Sokolow.
• Copilot environments are gaining some traction, but not much beyond ambient dictation in the EMR. “Through this technology, clinicians will have the ability to focus on the patient rather than the computer, and this is going to lead to better outcomes and ultimately better health care for all,” says Dr. David Rhew, global chief medical officer at Microsoft.

On the whole, AI is being embedded to solve specific problems—resiliency, pricing and inventory management. At the same time, GHX is helping create a foundation for agent-to-agent experiences to improve the user experience. We’re working to simplify data-to-action journeys.

Our recommendation

The second half of 2025 is about scale. GHX is helping lead the way, rolling out GHX ResiliencyAI to over 35,000 end-user customers across GHX’s North American network of more than 4,100 providers and 600 suppliers. Moving AI programs from pilot to production should be the priority. We’ll have to wait and see how well the supply chain as a whole manages this transition in the months ahead.

Healthcare Supply Chains Will Prioritize Workforce Transformation to Attract and Retain Top Talent

In our January predictions, I stated that while healthcare is progressing along the supply chain maturity curve, many aspects remain manual, with staff engaged in mundane tasks. I proposed that healthcare organizations will need to provide opportunities for top talent to practice at the top of their licenses and leverage the latest technologies to attract them.

As of July 2025, we are seeing emerging progress toward this goal. Talent remains hard to find, though some organizations are beginning to make strides.

• Mid-level workforce shortages are increasing. According to the Health Resources & Services Administration, RN supply increased by 1% between 2022 and 2025, but demand increased by 3%.
• Reskilling and digital literacy are now being discussed at events.
• University partnerships are ramping up, but still lagging. “Strategic partnerships are the engine of healthcare growth in 2025. They allow organizations to expand their reach, improve patient outcomes and strengthen community health while addressing operational and financial challenges,” says Susan Burroughs, Vice President of Operations at Wilson Medical Center.

The reality is that workforce change is strategic. Increasing opportunities for top talent at your organization will lead to follow-on impacts as that talent positively impacts your operations. GHX solutions help elevate roles from manual to analytical, making the SCM career attractive to high performers.

Our recommendation

In the second half of 2025, the industry needs embedded training and public positioning of SCM as a tech-forward, value-driven career path. Evaluate your hiring processes to ensure you’re able to attract top talent.

Healthcare Will Tackle Deeper Layers of Cost with a Focus on Complex Supply Chains

Our early-year prediction stemmed from the observation that, having made significant progress in automating and optimizing the procurement and management of high-volume, low-cost supplies, many organizations were now ready to tackle more intricate challenges, such as the implantable device supply chain.

In January, I said that costs have stemmed from the vast amount of clinical and supply chain staff resources required to manage implantable devices manually, as well as the overstocking of implants that expire before being used.

As of July 2025, this process is progressing, especially for implantables. Early-stage pilots reveal promise, despite persistent data and workflow inconsistencies.

• Ambulatory surgery centers (ASCs) are increasing focus on implantable device costs. An Advantien report says: “Let’s say, for example, you have a payer contract with a $1,000 threshold on a particular implant before they will reimburse you. If your RCM bills the implant at $995, the payer won’t reimburse your ASC for the implant.”
• Scheduling signals are being integrated with inventory planning to support better alignment between supply availability and clinical needs. According to Data Insights Market, “The healthcare inventory management market is experiencing robust growth, driven by several key factors. The increasing adoption of electronic health records (EHRs) and the integration of inventory management systems with EHRs enhances operational efficiency and reduces medical errors.”
• There is increasing supplier-provider data collaboration. According to a GHX case study on McLeod Health, “After implementing GHX Marketplace Bill Only, they achieved 96% contract compliance rate and 98.8% perfect order rate for these orders.”

Implantables are an increasing cost center of patient care, with the cost of many implants exceeding reimbursement amounts. This complex supply chain cost is better addressed with more data automation and insight-driven procurement. GHX supports this foundational cross-functional linkage.

Our recommendation

Look to increase the scale of AI pilots and embed analytics in implantable management. Integrate systems across the value chain including the electronic medical record, manufacturer field inventory and supply chain platforms. Leaders will be better positioned to lower costs and enhance care delivery, while the industry as a whole will benefit from these efforts.

Innovative Supply Chain Models Will Expand to Support Non-Acute Care Growth

Our prediction: In 2025, the healthcare supply chain will continue to evolve to meet growing patient demands for care access in non-acute settings, such as community-based clinics, ASCs and home-based care. As I wrote in January, when trading partners find a model that helps ensure clinicians have the supplies they need for patient care — when they need them, and with less waste — they are likely to scale it to additional clinics and deploy it with other trading partners.

This prediction has proven accurate, with pilots in ASCs and home health progressing. Although scalability challenges remain.

• ASC volumes and margins are increasing. “The ambulatory surgical centers market accounted for USD 105.58 billion in 2024 and is predicted to increase to USD 183.1 billion by 2034,” according to a report from Towards Healthcare. It adds: “Overall, AI integration in ASCs is driving innovation, improving efficiency, and enhancing patient care.”
• Automation & logistics needs are rising in decentralized settings. “AI and data analytics improved dispatch models, optimizing routes and turnaround times,” says Research and Market, referencing an expected growth in the healthcare transportation services market to $159.9 billion by 2034.
• Shared utilization data driving benchmarking. The White House announced on July 26th a plan to increase healthcare data sharing.

These data points illustrate support shifting to non-acute growth through visibility, automation and redesigned workflows.

Our recommendation

Non-acute growth demands flexible, analytics-based SCM and, in the future, agentic AI workflow. The second half of 2025 is the window to build that foundation.