By Elaina Myers, Assistant Editor

Nearly every healthcare facilities leader sees artificial intelligence (AI) as part of the future of facilities management, but far fewer are actually prepared to use it.  

A recent Bellrock study found that 99 percent of leaders believe their current facilities management model is not fit for AI. Only 6 percent of healthcare respondents said they were very confident that their property data was accurate and standardized enough for AI to be effective.

These numbers highlight a clear gap between healthcare facilities leaders who want the benefits of AI but lack the data foundations required to reap those benefits.  

“I don’t think it’s necessarily about the right technology,” says Jamie Cameron, vice president of OpenBlue at Johnson Controls. “It’s about having the right data. And it’s about having that data in one place in the right structure.”  

That challenge is particularly complex in healthcare where operational information is spread across building systems, work orders, equipment and other services. AI layered on top of fragmented data may deliver isolated wins, Cameron says, but it won’t provide the full picture that facilities teams ultimately need.  

Healthcare organizations can start by identifying a specific problem AI could help solve, then determine what data is needed to support it.  

“There have been huge advances in AI that now allow maintenance teams to be vastly more efficient because you can automate creating work orders and you can automate closing them,” Cameron says. 

But getting started does not mean overhauling every system at once.  

“Begin with the basics,” Cameron says. “Get operational data out of your existing building systems in a secure way and then organize it so it can be used effectively.”  

Organizations also need to think carefully about cybersecurity and protecting the technology infrastructure that generates it.  

“Having a cyber secure approach to the way that you get data, process it and store it is really paramount,” Cameron says.  

Governance also needs to be established before using AI.

“I think every organization should put an AI council together, which should consist of a group of individuals across the business from cyber, legal, medical, all the way through to the operational team,” Cameron says. “AI is a cross-functional movement and shift in the way that organizations can get value out of data, so encouraging AI councils to embrace it, to play with it and to understand the value of it will help reduce the amount of people frightened of it.” 

Healthcare facilities should also think beyond the immediate payoff. Cameron recommends collecting enough historical information to reveal trends and seasonality.  

“For many applications, organizations need six months to a year of data to understand how a building behaves across different seasons,” Cameron says.  

With that baseline in place, AI can move beyond simply reporting what is happening in a building and begin helping facilities teams identify patterns or anomalies and anticipate potential problems to make more informed decisions.  

For hospitals working with a limited budget, this approach also means they don’t have to wait for a massive, organization-wide AI deployment to begin building that foundation. They can start with a focused use case, securely collect the relevant data and continue building their historical record as they expand into additional applications.  

Cameron believes the healthcare organizations that ultimately distinguish themselves will be those that use AI to free employees from routine tasks.  

“It’s about creating space for people to go and add value,” Cameron says. “And in a healthcare environment, that obviously means saving lives and healing people.” 

Elaina Myers is the assistant editor of the facilities market. She has covered various topics from pest management to resilience to sustainability and covers all holidays and special days in the facilities field. She also manages the FacilitiesNet social media accounts.