In the patient payments space – just like healthcare information technology, in general – change happens at an accelerated pace.
Across the healthcare industry, we are witnessing a rapid shift towards digital transformation to improve patient care, operational efficiency, and data management. In 2024, trends we saw included a growing emphasis on security and compliance, the continued retail-ization of healthcare, and an increased realization of providers’ need to cater to generational differences among patients.
One thing that never seems to change in healthcare is patients’ concerns about the affordability of medical bills. For example, about half of Americans, including those with health insurance, report concern with their ability to afford their out-of-pocket healthcare costs in addition to their monthly groceries, a recent survey from PhRMA and Ipsos found.
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The survey also showed that one-third of those with insurance said their out-of-pocket costs for health care services had increased over the prior year, and 18% reported having outstanding medical debt.
While worries about the affordability of care are sure to persist for many Americans over the coming year, here are some other patient payment trends for providers to watch in 2025.
Growing use of alternate payment methods: Digital wallets such as PayPal, Venmo, Google Pay, and Apple Pay can be easily accessed with computers or smartphones and eliminate the need for consumers to carry traditional wallets or credit or debit cards. For providers and patients, digital wallets offer greater convenience, ease-of-use, and efficiency than traditional methods of medical bill payment. In addition, digital wallets offer multi-layered security.
The need to actively manage cards on file: As providers offer payment plans to help patients manage their medical expenses, the volume of cards-on-file will increase. To keep pace, providers need to manage cards-on-file by identifying and updating and/or unstoring old or inactive account information. Due in part to patients’ concerns about financial security, payment card tokenization technology has taken on increasing importance for providers. Tokenization is a process of replacing sensitive information, such as card account numbers, with benign values called a token, which allows providers to store patients’ payment data for future use securely, without capturing, storing, or transmitting sensitive payment data themselves. Managing these tokens can help improve collections and reduce risk.
Shifting payment infrastructure to the cloud: Most providers have already moved their electronic health records to the cloud. They should look to do the same with their payments infrastructure to increase flexibility, scalability, and efficiency with security and compliance at the center. Cloud-based payment solutions are easier to deploy, troubleshoot, and manage, and offer support for all major digital payment types.
The emergence and application of AI: Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) shows potential in healthcare operations, care delivery and more. Recent innovations in GenAI could be the antidote to the troubling levels of burnout that affect so many healthcare workers. In addition to automating tasks that would have previously required staffing resources, using AI in healthcare can also make sure that existing staff are being used more effectively and that workloads are distributed equitably.
A focus on data security: While generative AI no doubt possesses positive potential to deliver new tools that simplify back-office operations, reporting, customer service and more, it also offers new ways for bad actors to illegally access sensitive data. Using AI to improve their automated attacks is one way that malicious parties are misusing AI to steal data. Consistent, timely security awareness training is certainly one way to help empower security-aware employees. Providers can also help mitigate the likelihood of data theft through data minimization; that is, don’t store what you don’t need.
Patient payments technology that protects sensitive patient data with tokenization and validated point-to-point encryption (vP2PE) while promoting PCI DSS compliance is one method of reducing data storage. Tokenization replaces the Primary Account Number (PAN) with secure tokens. If intercepted, the data contains no cardholder information, rendering it useless to hackers. In vP2PE transactions, data is fully encrypted from the point a patient enters their payment information to the point when it is received by the payment processor. vP2PE can reduce providers’ risk of falling victim to payment data breaches as well as the number of resources needed for PCI DSS compliance.
As we look toward 2025, technology and evolving consumer needs and preferences will be major drivers of healthcare change – and no doubt we will see more exciting changes on the horizon!
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Johnathan (John) Welch is Chief Product Officer at Sphere, where he leads the Product organization and drives the roadmap for Sphere's payment and healthcare focused product suite. Originally from London, England, John is an internationally minded payments expert with over 15 years of experience working for some of the largest payment providers and banks in the world, including leadership roles at Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase, WorldPay, and MasterCard.
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