AI Recasts EHRs as Growth Engines for Health Tech

Electronic health records are getting an AI upgrade. Long treated as back-office tools, EHRs now attracting investors as startups add on tools that automate documentation, identify patients who qualify for clinical trials, and cut routine work for staff. These new tools and add-ons for EHRs are helping boost health tech venture funding. PitchBook says the 2025 deal count is on pace to match pre-pandemic levels, and the median round size is at a 10-year high, or 44 percent above the pre-pandemic baseline. While large vendors like Epic and Oracle are rolling out new AI features, smaller companies are raising capital to bring ambient notes, coding, and integrations into EHR workflows. Already in August, at least four companies announced funding for EHR add-on tools, from senior-living records and AI medical coding to decision support and a public EHR vendor’s equity raise, adding to earlier 2025 rounds that together total hundreds of millions of dollars. “The electronic health records area is the center of a surging wave of venture capital healthtech investment,” analysts from RSM US LLP wrote in a post. “These platforms have evolved into comprehensive operational and clinical hubs, fueling a boom in a sector now energized by artificial intelligence.”

What “AI-first” Looks Like in Clinics

Hospitals are rolling out tools that listen to visits and draft notes for clinician review, along with voice navigation to cut the need for manual data entry. Epic just previewed native ambient scribing and assistants for discharge planning and patient flow, while Oracle released a voice-first ambulatory EHR with agent-style prompts. Early trials suggest ambient scribes can reduce documentation time and burnout, though financial gains are not yet clear. Clinicians are also beginning to “ask” records questions in plain language. Stanford’s ChatEHR lets users query charts and get concise summaries to speed handoffs and chart review; the pilot remains small but shows how search and triage could work inside the record. EHRs themselves are opening more doors for add-ons from third parties. Suki’s ambient notes now plug into mid-market EHR systems, letting clinicians review AI-drafted text and post directly to the chart. Hospitals and senior-care providers are backing tools that give staff time back. In senior living, August Health raised $29 million this month to build more AI into its EHR so routine tasks and workflows run faster. In hospitals, Hellocare.ai picked up $47 million in April to expand AI-assisted virtual care that turns rooms into connected environments and writes ambient notes back to the chart for clinician review. Investors are also following clearer return-on-investment targets inside the record. Arintra raised $21 million in August to automate medical coding and help reduce denials, which is an EHR-adjacent function tied to revenue cycle results. Qventus closed $105 million in January to scale “AI operational assistants” for surgery and inpatient capacity, aiming to cut delays and cancellations by acting on EHR data. Some are funding the data layer itself, such as Innovaccer’s $275 million in January to unify records and support AI workflows across systems.

The integration and cost challenge

Linking new tools to core EHRs still takes time and money. A 2025 physician survey found EHR speed and reliability remain key pain points, with 47 percent saying response times fall short and 25 percent citing reliability issues, according to KLAS Research. Meanwhile, annual maintenance fees typically run 15 to 20 percent of the initial implementation cost. That doesn’t include recurring fees for third-party integrations or training, which can add about $1,000 to $10,000 plus per integration per year and roughly $500 to $1,200 for each user annually. Despite the challenges, market analysts don’t see the industry slowing down anytime soon. One forecast predicts the AI-enhanced EHR segment will grow at a 26 percent annual growth rate, hitting $53 billion by 2033, reflecting demand for tools that automate work and feed cleaner data back to the record. “The health care industry is undergoing a fundamental shift, viewing technology not as a cost center but as a strategic asset,” according to RSM analysts. “The proliferation of AI is accelerating this trend, transforming EHRs from a back-office necessity to a high-growth investment category.”