04 Jan The Best Practical Uses for AI in Home Health Agencies
How AI Can Reshape Workflow & Operations in Home Health Care
Improving retention, relieving administrative burdens, saving time & process improvement, a guide to utilizing AI in the home health care environment
Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly changing life as we know it across many industries. It is proving to be a powerful tool for improving many aspects of healthcare from access to efficiency. Home health agencies (HHAs) are wise to tap into the power of AI to solve one of their biggest burdens: retention. Using home health software with AI can assist in targeting pain points within the agency such as workflow burdens, scheduling, onboarding and education, and can support home health agencies build stronger and resilient teams.
A June 2025 report from Aging and Health Technology Watch report AI technology will increasingly support hybrid models of caregiving in home health by combining in-person caregiver roles with supplemental AI tools. No department or role will be left behind. The key is to funnel AI the most into areas of greatest need with the agency.
The caregiver retention crisis in home health
Staff turnover has long plagued the home health industry. The demands of caregiving, inconsistent schedules, and administrative overload all are well known to contribute to burnout. According to a 2024 survey by the Home Care Association of America (HCAOA), staffing shortages remain the top concern for home-based care providers as turnover peaked near 80% in 2024 with no relief in sight. Over half of HHAs are reportedly already investing in or planning to adopt AI solutions to address the issue.
Poor retention affects many aspects of HHAs operations. High turnover disrupts continuity of care, erodes client trust, and amplifies the budget loss to recruitment and training costs.
Agencies that can stabilize their workforce gain a competitive edge in both care quality and operational efficiency. AI can reduce significant burdens in the time consuming minutia of caring for patients in a HIPAA compliant model. Caregivers that can do their jobs easier, are happier and more focused on their patients. Time savings equate to agencies making more revenue at a lower cost, and could even result in higher compensation to retain and attract more nurses and caregivers. The connection between AI innovation in patient care and keeping a satisfied staff will become clearer as AI features and innovations become more standard in agencies.
AI for removing administrative burdens in home health
AI is a scalable tool that can offset many problems at the root cause of caregiver dissatisfaction. Caregivers often spend a significant portion of their time on documentation, scheduling, and compliance tasks. Time is often wasted searching for notes, labs and orders within the disarray of medical records. Incorporating an AI-powered home health software is the first step to reduce administrative burdens on both caregiver and leadership roles.
AI-powered automation tools can streamline operational processes. For example, natural language processing (NLP) tools greatly advance efficiency in how information in electronic medical records is generated and organized from its all-too-often unstructured and disorganized format leading to essential details being missed and forgotten altogether.
NLP allows many workflow improvements such as:
- voice-to-text documentation,
- reducing time spent on manual entry of medication reconciliation at start of care,
- improved communication between disciplines (suggested data to report, trends identification to discuss),
- the ability to flag missing or inconsistent data prior to billing submissions reducing claim denials,
- care plan creation using existing and new data.
AI impact on home health scheduling and workload
AI can optimize caregiver-client matching based on skill sets, preferences, assigned case manager, availability, and location which can reduce friction amongst the team. Predictive analytics can also forecast staffing needs before the need arises to crisis page staff and offer incentive pay.
AI tools can also detect the percentage of time a caregiver is assigned high-acuity clients or longer commutes, both of which can increase turnover. Adjusting assignments proactively helps maintain morale and workload.
Additionally, NLP can be trained to predict risk of caregiver turnover at HHAs, suggest early interventions and check in more frequently to promote engagement.
AI for home health care educational support
As home health clients present with increasingly complex needs, caregivers often feel underprepared or unsupported. AI, specifically learning language models (LLMs) similar to ChatGPT can excel at producing high quality medical education tailored to audiences of caregivers and clients. Given precise prompts, LLMs can make the most complex conditions, tasks, or treatments manageable, less overwhelming, and understandable. LLMs can be prompted to read aloud or create visuals for those who prefer to learn through charts, pictures, or diagrams.
Often within HHAs, one person wears multiple hats to onboard new staff, monitor the infection prevention program compliance and more. AI can support the educational role by creating:
- a quality onboarding program. For example, current agency policies can uploaded into the program and prompts given to summarize, create visually appealing presentations or activities to liven up a traditional classroom onboarding experience.
- case studies or other active learning activities based on the most common client medical needs the HHA encounters.
How AI can improve communication and engagement for home health agencies
AI chatbots and virtual assistants can manage routine inquiries from clients and families, reducing the communication burden on caregivers or administration. They can also support facilitation of answering questions from staff in a timelier manner than leadership can respond. Additionally, conversational AI tools have memory and often offer follow-up questions to promote a deeper understanding of their inquiry.
Home health caregivers can feel disengaged and lonely. When the breakroom is a local gas station and there is limited interaction on a daily basis with colleagues, some caregivers miss the social aspect that comes with brick-and-mortar caregiver positions. AI can be used to personalize recognition and rewards, reinforcing positive behaviors and boosting team unity and morale. When caregivers feel seen, supported and part of the bigger HHA community they are more likely to stay.
Implementation of AI in home health environments
Despite the promise of AI, adoption is not without challenges. Ethical considerations and best practices need to be strictly adhered to with the use of AI in healthcare. To overcome these barriers, leaders should:
- Start small. Pilot one AI tool or process with a small group before scaling.
- Involve caregivers and ensure human oversight. When integrating AI, ensure guidelines are created that support caregivers but do not replace clinical judgement. Solicit feedback and provide ongoing and adequate training to build trust, buy-in and ensure appropriate use.
- Prioritize data security but ensure representation of client populations the HHA cares for. Ensuring compliance with HIPAA is crucial and patient centered care is essential. When deciding to use AI tools for clients, ensure the diversity of the client population is represented to reduce bias practices but keep identities strictly confidential.
- Measure impact. Track retention, satisfaction, and efficiency (including percentages of denied claims, billable hours) to evaluate which AI tools are giving the most return on investment.
National AI Goals for healthcare and home health
In November 2025, the US Government recognized the positive potential AI has for healthcare. The Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced the competition AI Innovation for America’s Caregivers which looks to award $2 million in prize money to an innovation using AI to support caregivers of the aging population. The focus is to “educate, assist, and reduce administrative strain…”. This Initiative is intended to also support home health agencies and the ongoing staffing crisis.
The Takeaway
AI is not replacing caregivers; it is building efficiency and reinforcing them. By automating mundane tasks and enhancing the human side of healthcare, AI can allow caregivers to do the caring work they signed up for better, faster, and with a higher level of near flawless efficiency.
For home health agency leaders, the message is clear that investing in AI is not just a tech upgrade, but rather, it’s a retention strategy. Agencies that embrace AI tactfully will be set up to better retain the workforce they need to thrive in 2026.
Other helpful articles
- The 5 Biggest ways AI is Transforming Home Health Care Documentation
- Evaluating home health software with AI built-in
- Podcast – What are the biggest ways AI is Revolutionizing Home Health Care
- A Guide to Home Health Software with AI
References:
- Aging and Health Technology Watch Article
- Survey by the Home Care Association of America (HCAOA
- Natural language processing (NLP)
- How the ChatGPT model excels at producing high quality medical education
- Ethical considerations and best practices for AI in healthcare
- AI Innovation for America’s Caregivers competition
Alora is engineered to keep home health agencies running at peak efficiency. From built-in AI features, to dashboards and tools tracking the most critical components of care, to our team providing agencies with the highest level of agency training and support, Alora’s easy to use system streamlines clinical documentation, tracks patient care, manages billing operations, and ensures regulatory compliance.
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