Jason Maynard has stepped in as CEO of Qualtrics this year with a reputation for operational discipline. That matters in health tech. Hospitals and payers don’t buy narrative. They buy outcomes tied to cost, risk, and compliance. Under that kind of leadership, experience data has to justify itself in financial and clinical terms.
That’s the backdrop for Qualtrics’ 2026 strategy, and why it feels more like infrastructure than CX tooling. Intent tech, in this context, means interpreting signals early enough to change the course of care or service. Not waiting for post-discharge surveys or quarterly satisfaction reports. By then, the patient has already switched providers or filed a complaint.
“AI is reshaping how every organization operates, how they serve customers, how they engage employees, and how they make critical decisions,” shared Maynard. “In a world increasingly shaped by AI, the ability to understand the human experience and act on what matters in context is crucial. That’s why I’ve joined Qualtrics.”
Signals are everywhere. Repeated appointment reschedules. Frustration in call transcripts. Portal abandonment. Negative sentiment in nurse interactions. Individually, they look minor. Together, they often predict escalation, non-adherence, or churn to another network.
Historically, those signals lived in silos. Clinical data in one system. Experience data in another. Operations guessing in the middle.
Qualtrics is trying to stitch that together and push insights directly into workflows. Route at-risk patients to care teams sooner. Trigger follow-ups automatically. Flag service breakdowns before they become grievances. It’s less about surveying patients and more about orchestrating a response.
Qualtrics Health Connect brings patient feedback gathered from questionnaires distributed through email, QR Code, SMS, or mobile apps directly into an individual patient record for a more complete view of each patient. For example, feedback from an oncology patient and their sensitivity to certain room conditions can be added to a patient record, prompting the caregiver to be more sensitive or responsive to the patient’s needs.
“Greater interoperability between experience data and EMR operational data will empower clinicians to deliver more personalized and compassionate care to every patient,” said Patty Riskind, Head of Global Healthcare, Qualtrics. “With Health Connect, healthcare providers can customize and personalize outreach to patients, gaining unique and relevant insights about individual care experiences.”
This lines up with broader enterprise AI trends. PwC’s latest AI Agent Survey reports that 79% of organizations are already deploying AI agents capable of executing multi-step tasks inside operational workflows, not just analyzing information. Healthcare, with its labor constraints and thin margins, is an obvious candidate for that kind of automation.
Still, there are limits. Healthcare isn’t e-commerce. You can’t over-automate sensitive interactions or risk compliance and trust. Misreading sentiment or triggering the wrong intervention has real consequences. Governance isn’t optional here. It’s table stakes.
Fewer missed follow-ups, fewer complaints, and fewer patients quietly slipping away.
In health systems, that’s what progress looks like. More predictability. Experience data, finally doing operational work instead of sitting in reports that no one has time to read.
FAQs
1. Is intent tech actually useful in healthcare, or just another patient survey trend?
Useful only if it changes workflows. Surveys after discharge don’t fix anything. Early signals that trigger outreach or care intervention do.
2. How is Qualtrics different from the reporting we already get from EHR and patient portals?
EHRs show clinical history. Intent layers add sentiment and behavioral context. They help predict who might disengage, miss care, or escalate, not just document what already happened.
3. Can experience data really move financial outcomes in health systems?
Yes, but indirectly. Fewer readmissions, fewer complaints, and better adherence protect reimbursement and reduce service costs. Small operational fixes compound fast at scale.
4. What’s the biggest risk with AI-driven patient intent models?
Overconfidence. Models misread context, and healthcare isn’t forgiving. One wrong escalation or missed risk can have clinical and regulatory consequences. Humans still need the final call.
5. Who should own the intent strategy inside a provider or payer organization?
No single team. IT manages infrastructure, operations acts on signals, and clinical leadership validates impact. If it sits with just “patient experience,” it gets deprioritized.
Dive deeper into the future of healthcare. Keep reading on Health Technology Insights.
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