This past March, the PCI Pal team took to Las Vegas to participate in the 65th annual Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society (HIMSS) conference in Las Vegas. As exhibitors, we had the privilege of speaking with countless professionals from across the industry.
Over the course of the 4-day conference, we were able to gather a wealth of perspectives and insights on the state of healthcare technology and what the sector needs most right now. While we could likely fill a tome with everything we heard, certain themes and throughlines kept reemerging across conversations.
In the following blog post, we’ll explore those key takeaways, what they mean for the industry, and how PCI Pal is perfectly positioned to address some of the industry’s greatest challenges:
Takeaway #1:
In the Face of Widespread Burnout, the Best Healthcare Tech is Invisible
Nearly 75% of healthcare workers today say the introduction of new technology (such as EHRs) contributes to burnout. At a time when the U.S. healthcare system is facing roughly 1.9 million job openings annually through 2033 and turnover rates in excess of 15%, the need to attract and retain talent is paramount.
While many of these new technologies are aimed at driving efficiencies and improving patient outcomes, the reality is, every new tool that gets added to staff’s workflows risks driving them away. At the same time, simply foregoing new technologies altogether isn’t a viable option either. Increasing demands from patients, regulators, and boards will invariably require the adoption of new technologies.
This is why it is of the utmost importance that any new tool or technology added to an organization’s stack must be as frictionless as humanly possible. Steep learning curves, clunky interfaces, and cumbersome workflows are a guaranteed way to increase burnout and discourage use. For new technologies to be successfully implemented and adopted, they should aim to be simultaneously invisible and indispensable. Deliver value without disruption. Enable without the need to educate. The less of a presence the tech actually has in workers’ day-to-day experience, the better.
Today’s ballooning healthcare tech stack has put a lot of people on edge. The idea of requiring onboarding time, introducing new workflows, and ultimately creating extra work for already overextended healthcare workers (even if there is demonstrable value in the technology) is quickly becoming a non-starter for industry decision-makers.
Takeaway #2:
As the Tech Ecosystem Expands, Integration is Imperative
Of course, this sensitivity to new technologies doesn’t come from nowhere. It’s grounded in the reality that today’s healthcare IT ecosystems are growing increasingly bloated and fragmented.
The average mid-sized to large hospital system in the U.S. today runs anywhere from 100 to 300 distinct software applications across its IT stack, with the vast majority coming from different vendors and developers, with each one posing a risk of increased fragmentation and sprawl.. While certain vendors, such as Epic, have become all but omnipresent, there remain countless other developers and vendors in use that complicate and divide ecosystems.
This is leading to a cry for help that we heard time and time again during our time at HIMSS: buyers want streamlined solutions that offer interoperability and seamless integration with their existing tools.
As an organization immersed in the healthcare space, we understand full and well why this is such a pressing matter. Mitigating fragmentation and bloat is about more than simple cost-control and convenience. Siloed, disjointed systems can lead to increased compliance risk due to blind spots, lost opportunities for optimization, unnecessary operational drag, disjointed patient experiences, overextended IT teams, and once again, mounting burnout for already scarce healthcare workers.
We saw the immense appeal of integration first-hand at HIMSS, illustrated by the profound amount of interest we saw in our PCI Pal Connector for Epic. When passers-by saw that PCI Pal was in the Epic Showroom, they instantly felt relief knowing that it can be integrated with one of the largest parts of their tech ecosystems.
“One of the most consistent themes we heard throughout the event was enthusiasm for our Epic integration,’ said Nicole Von Seggern, VP of Marketing at PCI Pal. “It was clear this meant a lot to them, and it’s no wonder why. Not only is it a clear indicator of ease of adoption, but it also served as a kind of stamp of approval for our platform’s readiness and maturity in the healthcare space.”
Takeaway #3:
The Healthcare Industry Must Bridge the PCI Compliance Awareness Gap
While the Epic logo elicited sighs of relief, it also became clear to our team that there was an awareness gap that persisted around PCI DSS Compliance in the healthcare space.
With so many challenges to consider in this large and complex industry, it’s not surprising that this gap exists. However, as regulatory requirements stiffen, security concerns mount, and patient and employee experience become more important than ever to organizations’ resilience, there is a real need to close that gap—and quickly.
Despite a growing push for self-serve models, 86% of healthcare payments still involve human interaction. Patients facing large bills and insurance complexities often need assistance. And that isn’t likely to change anytime soon. However, this payment moment is more fragile than ever, presenting compliance risk, security risk, and risk of compromised patient loyalty.
We most likely needn’t convince you of the seriousness of cyber risk in the healthcare space. For several years running, healthcare has remained the number one most targeted industry for cybercriminals, and the average cost of said attacks is rising. In 2025, healthcare topped IBM’s breach cost league table for the twelfth consecutive year, averaging $7.42 million per incident. And the damage isn’t just financial. Breaches of these sorts can have long lasting negative impacts on patient acquisition and retention.
However, what’s often overlooked is how secure, compliant, and seamless payment experiences impact the patient experience. In a recent industry survey, over 50% of patients said that poor payment experiences would motivate them to switch providers. And for those under the age of 35, that figure rose to 72%, indicating rising expectations for smooth payment experiences among patients—expectations which will only grow as today’s younger cohorts age and represent a larger portion of the overall patient pool.
It’s clear that payments have become one of the most complex and high-risk moments in the healthcare journey. Revenue, compliance, security, and patient trust are all on the line. Those that can close the PCI awareness gap fastest, will undoubtedly gain a significant leg up in today’s increasingly competitive healthcare landscape.
Conclusion: The PCI Pal Solution
Attending HIMSS truly opened our eyes to just how much need there is for efficient, effective, integrated secure payment solutions in healthcare.
With the human element still central to the healthcare payment experience (and compliance, security, and CX demands mounting) providers need robust yet streamlined solutions to secure the payment moment.
PCI Pal does exactly that, by protecting patient and member payment data across every touchpoint—whether interactions are staff-assisted or automated, and across CCaaS, UCaaS, and healthcare billing and administrative processes.
By eliminating the presence of cardholder data from personnel, voice channels (including recordings), and internal systems, PCI Pal helps reduce PCI scope while enabling:
- Improved payment experiences and higher completion rates
- Stronger collections outcomes and faster revenue realization
- Greater operational resilience
- Enhanced governance and audit preparedness
PCI Pal also connects seamlessly with existing telephony platforms, CCaaS and UCaaS solutions, EHR systems (including Epic), billing platforms, and payment gateways via a single API. This approach allows healthcare organizations to secure payments while maintaining their current workflows and avoiding increased burnout and operational fragmentation.
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