A patient arrives at a rural hospital with chest discomfort. There is no cardiologist on site, and the nearest is two counties away. What if instead of transferring the patient miles from home, a nurse could press a button and a cardiologist would appear on a large screen, reviewing an EKG with the patient and their family and starting a treatment plan — even before a transfer to another facility could have ever been arranged?
Or, imagine a patient recovering from surgery who believes she is steady enough to get up on her own when she isn’t. As the patient sits up and shifts toward the side of the bed, cameras and sensors in the room recognize a potentially dangerous movement pattern and alert a virtual nurse, who is monitoring the patient remotely. The virtual nurse speaks to the patient through the in-room television, asking her to stay put while simultaneously contacting the bedside nurse, who arrives to assist the patient and prevent what could have been a serious fall.
Inside the Room of the Future
At Advocate Health, these are not hypotheticals. They are already happening.
Various “Room of the Future” technologies are being implemented at many of our 69 hospitals across our six-state footprint. Four fully equipped pilot sites are live — Atrium Health Lake Norman, Atrium Health Pineville and Atrium Health Stanly in North Carolina, and Advocate Illinois Masonic Medical Center in Chicago — with plans to expand the model across the entire enterprise over the next three years. That expansion will begin with a focus on Advocate Health’s 19 rural hospitals, where our rural patients often lack consistent access to specialty care.
Meanwhile, more than 6,000 physicians and advanced practice providers across Advocate Health have incorporated hands-free, automated documentation tools into their care. We are expanding this technology to support our nurses as well, helping reduce administrative burden and advancing our mission to make Advocate Health the best place to care, as well as be cared for.
When the hospital room joins the care team
Every Room of the Future includes permanently installed, two‑way audio and video, allowing remote team members to join the bedside care team within seconds. Smart sensors recognize meaningful patterns — from when a patient needs repositioning to when a room needs cleaning — and prompt the right response at the right time.
Clinicians are also supported by smart documentation tools that safely and securely monitor patient interactions, automatically generating draft notes and populating flow sheets with patient vitals.
These tools are developed in close partnership with our care teams to ensure the technology addresses real-world clinical needs. Each solution is carefully reviewed and tested to ensure it is ethical, secure, reliable, transparent to the patient and impactful. The cameras provide live video only. Nothing is recorded. Patients can turn on a privacy mode setting or have the camera turned away, when appropriate.
What this means for our patients
Behind the scenes, these capabilities allow technology to work quietly — supporting care teams without disrupting the patient experience.
In practice, this means:
- A virtual nurse can assist with admissions or patient education, enabling bedside nurses to focus on other patients’ non-administrative needs.
- A physician can maintain eye contact, ask thoughtful follow-up questions and fully engage in conversation, while notes are taken automatically, powered by technology in the room.
- A patient can simply start speaking and immediately alert a virtual nurse, without having to reach for a call button.
- A patient’s family can participate in care plan discussions remotely.
- A virtual interpreter can connect instantly with non-English-speaking patients.
What comes next
The Room of the Future is already enhancing patient care and supporting clinicians so they can focus their full attention on care delivery at our pilot sites. Over the next three years, these capabilities are expected to expand across all Advocate Health hospitals.
For our rural communities, the impact will be especially significant, with greater access to specialty care, faster treatment decisions and fewer transfers far from home.
Most importantly, our patients love it. Early feedback from our pilot units shows patients consistently report positive experiences, describing the care as clear, convenient and reassuring. The data reflects this feedback, with positive movement across metrics including patient length of stay, clinician cognitive burden reduction, patient experience, teammate satisfaction and reduced patient fall rates.
The Room of the Future is not about replacing the human touch. It’s about removing distractions, shortening the distance to expertise and ensuring that every moment of care — no matter where it happens — is as connected, responsive and personal as possible.
