2027 budget planning is putting healthcare leaders in a difficult position: control costs while continuing to improve patient access, operational efficiency, and the digital experience.
The financial pressure is significant. PwC projects a 9% medical cost trend for the commercial market in 2027, the highest in 17 years. At the same time, health systems are evaluating rapidly evolving AI tools, modernizing legacy technology, addressing interoperability challenges, and preparing for digital accessibility requirements.
These pressures raise the bar for every digital investment.
Websites, mobile apps, and other digital experiences can no longer be viewed primarily as marketing assets. They increasingly serve as infrastructure for patient access, connecting consumers to providers, appointments, locations, clinical information, and other essential services.
Modea’s 2026 Digital Maturity Research, which evaluated 27 U.S. health systems and surveyed more than 1,300 healthcare consumers, reinforces that shift. Among health systems surveyed, 55.6% cited operational transformation as a driver of digital investment, compared with 33.3% that cited brand and acquisition.
As health systems build their budgets for 2027 and beyond, the question should not simply be how much they are spending on digital. It should be what that investment enables patients and the organization to do.
1. Are You Funding Digital Access or Digital Brochures?
A website can look modern without meaningfully improving patient access.
2027 investments should prioritize the digital journeys that help patients take action, whether that means finding the right provider, locating care, identifying available appointments, scheduling a visit, or accessing their health information.
This is where digital experience becomes an operational investment. When patients can successfully complete routine tasks through self-service, health systems can reduce unnecessary reliance on call centers and staff while creating a better patient experience.
The opportunity is significant. Modea’s research found that 77% of consumers consider a seamless digital experience important when choosing a provider. Investing in digital access is therefore not simply about improving perception. It can influence whether a patient successfully enters and remains within your system.
2. Is Your Technology Creating Flexibility or More Fragmentation?
More than 75% of health systems in Modea’s research were planning or had recently completed a replatforming initiative. Yet 50% cited platform fragmentation as a challenge. Together, those findings underscore the importance of making platform investments that reduce complexity rather than add to it.
That makes architecture an important 2027 budget consideration.
Enterprise digital experience platforms can carry significant annual licensing costs, but they can also provide the governance, scalability, personalization, and content management capabilities health systems require. Composable and API-driven approaches can provide additional flexibility by connecting EHRs, enterprise platforms, and custom patient-facing experiences.
There is no single platform strategy that works for every organization. Health systems should evaluate total cost of ownership alongside interoperability, scalability, internal resources, vendor dependency, and their ability to adapt the patient experience over time.
3. Are You Treating Accessibility as an Ongoing Investment?
Accessibility belongs in the 2027 budget, not just on a compliance checklist.
HHS has extended the Section 504 deadline for applicable web content and mobile applications to May 11, 2027 for recipients with 15 or more employees. That puts accessibility directly within the near-term planning horizon.
Rather than waiting for an audit to uncover extensive remediation work, health systems should build accessibility into design, development, content governance, QA, and ongoing optimization.
This approach reduces the financial and operational risk of accumulating accessibility-related technical debt or other costs while helping ensure patients can access essential digital services regardless of ability.
4. Does Your Budget Account for What Happens After Launch?
Enterprise digital experiences are never truly finished.
Patients behave differently than teams expect. Analytics uncover friction. Search behavior changes. Accessibility issues emerge as new content and functionality are introduced.
Yet organizations often concentrate investment around a major launch and underfund what happens afterward.
As a starting point, Modea recommends allocating a portion of your annual digital budget to continuous optimization, including UX research and testing, behavioral analytics, conversion rate optimization, accessibility, performance improvements, and post-launch feature enhancements. The appropriate allocation will vary based on the maturity and needs of your digital ecosystem, but optimization should be planned and funded rather than addressed only when problems arise.
This is particularly important when resources are constrained. Modea’s research found that 57% of health systems face resource and budget gaps as a barrier to digital maturity.
A sustainable digital strategy does not just fund what you can launch. It funds what your organization can continuously improve.
5. Is AI Investment Strengthening Your Digital Strategy or Distracting From It?
AI will inevitably compete for attention in 2027 budget conversations. The rapid introduction of new tools also creates an expectation that teams can accomplish more with fewer resources.
But AI investment without the right foundation can simply add another layer of technology.
Modea’s Digital Maturity Research found that AI readiness depends on the broader environment around it: governance, data infrastructure, technology, teams, and connected digital capabilities. You should therefore evaluate AI as part of your overall digital roadmap rather than as an isolated innovation initiative.
AI is also changing how patients discover healthcare information. As search expands beyond traditional search engines into AI-powered experiences, health systems need to invest in findability: structured content, clear information architecture, accurate provider and location data, strong governance, and technical foundations that make information understandable across traditional and emerging discovery platforms.
The goal should not be to add AI everywhere. It should be to determine where AI can improve access, reduce operational friction, or create measurable value.
Proving the Value of Digital Investment
Protecting digital investment in a constrained budget environment requires connecting it to outcomes and measurable ROI that executives and financial leaders already care about.
Instead of relying primarily on pageviews, engagement, downloads, or app installs, health systems can connect digital performance to completed online appointments, new patient acquisition, digital self-service adoption, call center offloading, portal engagement, and reduced administrative work.
That changes the conversation from “What does our website cost?” to “What ROI does our digital ecosystem create?”
You don’t need to invest in every new technology. Looking ahead to 2027 and beyond, we recommend being more deliberate about what you fund and why.
When digital experiences improve access, reduce friction, support staff, connect enterprise technology, and help patients complete meaningful tasks, they are doing far more than marketing.
They are supporting the infrastructure of how healthcare gets delivered.
With Contributions From:
Glen Doss | VP Client Partner
Glen partners with healthcare organizations to navigate complex digital initiatives, helping teams align technology decisions with long-term business and patient experience goals.
Noey Neumark | Director of Growth
Noey works with healthcare leaders to identify digital strategies and investments that align patient needs with broader organizational goals.
Refining your FY27 digital budget and roadmap? Contact the Modea team to get started, or connect with Glen or Noey on LinkedIn.