Legal eagles forecast 3 healthcare AI trends to eyeball in 2026 and beyond

Rock, meet hard place. The Trump administration has been moving to relax regulatory hurdles that might slow healthcare AI innovation and adoption. This flies in the face of regulatory momentum in numerous states—particularly the several that have been tightening oversight. 

Heated tension if not outright conflict is inevitable, note two attorneys subspecialized in AI startup success, data privacy and cybersecurity.

“[F]ederal policy is seeking to reduce uncertainty and create an environment where responsible AI scales faster,” write Foley & Lardner partners Aaron Maguregui, JD, and Jennifer Hennessy, JD, MBA, in a report the firm posted Jan. 22. “At the same time, state privacy law is moving toward more laws, more definitions, more enforcement pathways and more operational friction. That is the struggle in 2026.”

In their three-page section of the 35-page report, “Health Care & Life Sciences Top Trends for 2026,” Maguregui and Hennessy concentrate on digital health and telehealth. They flesh out three trends by way of advising health-tech companies—and the provider organizations whose business these companies covet—to prepare now in order to thrive later. 

For example: 

1. AI governance becomes the fastest path to adoption. 

The era of “AI as a feature” is ending, Maguregui and Hennessy state. In 2026, they note, AI is increasingly the system of decision support, navigation and automation across telehealth, remote monitoring, care coordination and utilization workflows. For this reason, HHS is “focusing directly on how AI should be regulated, reimbursed and supported,” they write. 

The health-tech outfits primed to grow the fastest, the attorneys believe, are those that can answer certain questions “without hesitation.” Examples: 

• What does the model do, exactly, and what does it not do? 
   
• What data trained it, and do you have defensible rights to use that data for that purpose? 
   
• How do you monitor drift, bias and safety issues post-deployment? What is the human oversight and escalation path when AI influences care or clinical communications? 
   
• What is the human oversight and escalation path when AI influences care or clinical communications?

Maguregui and Hennessy recommend companies work through such questions by taking several action steps right now. Among them: Create an enterprise AI inventory, set a tiered governance model and contract for your AI position.

The other two healthcare AI trends the authors see coming (and have more to say about than you’re seeing here): 

2. State AI healthcare laws will start shaping product design.  

• California is a bellwether, passing multiple laws addressing the use of AI in healthcare in the past few years, Maguregui and Hennessy observe. Colorado “adds a broader risk-based structure through SB24-205, which imposes duties for high-risk AI systems and obligations tied to foreseeable risks of algorithmic discrimination.” The authors also summarize activities in Illinois and Texas. 

3. State privacy laws will create a compliance mosaic that rewards strong data engineering.

• State privacy is no longer “just a policy,” Maguregui and Hennessy  underscore. “It is an engineering requirement.” Washington’s My Health My Data Act and Nevada’s SB 370 specifically regulating consumer health data both took effect in 2024, the authors remind. Connecticut’s consumer data privacy law has specific requirements for consumer health data—and “many other state consumer data privacy laws regulate health data in some form as sensitive data.” 

Maguregui and Hennessy wrap their section on an optimistic note:

‘The regulatory and privacy environment is not a reason to slow down. It is a roadmap for building the kind of digital health and telehealth platforms that scale with confidence. HHS is explicitly asking how to accelerate AI adoption in clinical care. States are demanding transparency and stronger data discipline. The organizations that embrace both will move faster through enterprise contracting, reduce diligence drag in financings and merger and acquisitions (M&A), and earn durable user trust.’

The complete report is available for free in exchange for contact info here.