Healthcare’s Next Workforce Shift: Making Artificial Intelligence “Hireable”
Agent AI is moving beyond stand-alone models in healthcare. One health technology expert said these models are starting to act as “digital colleagues,” orchestrating tools, data and workflows to take on tasks once handled exclusively by clinicians and researchers.
Kimberly Powell, general manager of healthcare at Nvidia, believes this shift can quickly reduce burnout and expand clinical capabilities, but only if health system leaders stop viewing AI as software and start viewing it as a hireable workforce.
“The concept of these AI agents being hireable – I don't think that's fully embraced by C-suite yet. They don't see it that way – they currently view it as technology. You know, they don't view it as employees,” she said in an interview last month.
Powell noted that healthcare is fundamentally workflow-driven, which makes it a good candidate for agent AI systems.
She explained that the agent is designed to mirror the step-by-step workflows that clinicians already follow, coordinating models and tools to get real work done, rather than simply acting as passive software.
Unlike older software that was designed as a tool for humans, agents are designed to do their jobs themselves. Powell noted that modern software architecture makes this possible – she said advances such as APIs and tool calls mean agents can interact with legacy systems, accessing only the data they need and operating within strict guardrails.
In her view, guardrails transform risky models into producible systems—she notes that AI agents can only succeed with foundational models that have domain expertise, safety constraints, and the latest medical knowledge.
Powell explained that this approach reduces hallucinations and ensures regulatory compliance, which gives hospital leaders peace of mind that the AI tools can operate safely in clinical settings. With this assurance, adoption will accelerate quickly.
While “agent” still sounds like a buzzword, Powell said the technology is already entering actual production use, and some healthcare AI companies have quickly scaled up and relieved administrative tasks and clinical documentation burdens — she cited Abridge and Multiply Labs as examples.
She expects the trend to grow even faster over the next two years.
Powell believes agent AI has huge potential in augmenting understaffed teams. Over the next few years, she believes agency tools will increasingly be used as staff to enhance clinician practice and improve access to care.
Photo: wildpixel, Getty Images
