Automation Crossroads: Solving the Global Healthcare Bottleneck

By Dr. Don Capener, Chief Strategy Officer, Chang Robotics

How automation and robotics are reshaping healthcare’s most urgent challenge.

The healthcare industry is facing a critical, and frankly, unsustainable challenge: escalating nurse turnover. In 2024, these turnover rates reached alarming levels. This isn't just a staffing headache; it's a financial crisis and a threat to patient care.

Let's look at the numbers. The cost to replace a single nurse—including recruitment, onboarding, and training—now exceeds $53,250. For a large hospital system, this turnover translates into a staggering $21 million to $43 million in additional costs each year.

This financial burden, combined with the immense pressures of the post-pandemic environment, creates an urgent, undeniable need for innovation. But not just any innovation. We need solutions that are embraced by healthcare professionals and improve the hospital's bottom line.

A Global Problem, Not a Local One

This urgent need for innovation isn't just a U.S. problem. It’s a global one. This becomes clear when we compare our system to another advanced economy, such as Japan's.

At first glance, the two systems are inverted. Here in the U.S., we operate a mixed, high-cost, market-driven system. We spend nearly 20% of our GDP on healthcare, yet we often get worse outcomes, like lower life expectancy. As you know, this creates a combative relationship where hospitals are squeezed between two forces: the profit-driven denials from private insurers like United Healthcare, and the significant, government-imposed cost constraints of Medicare.

Japan, by contrast, has a universal system that achieves the world's highest life expectancy while spending less than half what we do per capita. Costs are contained because the government sets the price for every single procedure and service.

But look beneath the surface, and both systems are facing the exact same chokepoint: aging demographics.

The Demographic Cliff

In the U.S., we feel it as the looming insolvency of Medicare. In Japan, it is an existential national crisis. Japan is the world's first "super-aged" society. More than one in ten people there are over 80. As their Prime Minister recently warned, the nation is "on the verge of whether we can continue to function as a society."

This demographic cliff-edge creates profound pain points. Japan’s system, which pays per service, encourages over-utilization. The elderly, with more complex needs, visit specialists frequently. This, combined with low staffing ratios, has resulted in the longest average hospital stays in the developed world.

For Japanese society as a whole, this is a ticking time bomb. A shrinking workforce cannot possibly finance the escalating healthcare and pension costs for a rapidly expanding elderly population.

What are the alternatives? They are all painful. Raise taxes on the young? Cut services for the old? Both are politically toxic.

This leaves only one viable, scalable alternative for both Japan and the U.S.: We must find a way to do more with less. We must increase the productivity and efficiency of every nurse, doctor, and caregiver.

When Automation Becomes a Necessity

This is the moment where technology—specifically automation and robotics—stops being a "nice-to-have" innovation and becomes a "must-have" solution for national survival.

This global crisis—whether it's the financial friction of the U.S. system or the demographic chokepoint in Japan—is precisely why we dedicated ourselves to this challenge.

At Chang Robotics, we dedicated ourselves to this challenge. Through a rigorous two-year pilot program in a demanding hospital setting, our healthcare division, Curabotics, has demonstrated the transformative power of collaborative robotics.

The Curabotics Solution

Our solution, the Curabotics Nurse Assist Bot, was designed to seamlessly integrate into existing hospital workflows. It handles the very tasks that pull nurses away from their essential, human-centric work: transporting supplies, delivering meals, and moving beds.

The results were compelling.

First, and most importantly, it was embraced. We saw a 96% adoption rate from the nursing staff.

Why? Because it immediately gave them back their most valuable resource: time. Our implementation alleviated 15% of the average nurse's daily workload. And our data shows the potential is even greater. By automating these multiple, time-consuming functions, hospitals could save nurses up to 40% of their time—time that can be reinvested in direct patient care, clinical focus, and human interaction.

This isn't just an efficiency gain; it's a human one. 95% of nurses in the program reported feeling more supported and valued in their roles. This led to a 40% increase in nurse morale and, critically, a significant reduction in nurse turnover.

And when nurses are supported and satisfied, patients feel it. The program resulted in higher patient satisfaction scores and a measurably improved patient experience.

Measurable Impact and ROI

This brings me back to the financial crisis I mentioned at the start. This solution directly addresses it. The implementation of Curabotics Nurse Assist Bots resulted in a 10% optimization in resource utilization. The return on investment was achieved, through a break-even analysis, within 19 months. This creates sustainable cost savings that continue into perpetuity.

This is the power of automation when it's applied correctly. It enhances patient safety through accurate, timely supply delivery. It promotes a more sustainable healthcare system by reducing waste. And it builds a culture of innovation, empowering nurses to embrace technology as a partner.

The Next Frontier: Expanding Access to Care

But our vision for healthcare automation doesn't stop at the hospital's main campus. The next frontier is about expanding access to care itself.

As I detail in our new white paper, “Expanding Access and Redefining Care Delivery,” the next wave of innovation is about bringing care to the patient, wherever they are. A prime example is how innovations like OXOS Medical’s portable X-ray system are redefining accessibility.

By combining true portability with AI-driven precision, these devices enable faster diagnoses, lower costs, and extend advanced medical imaging to settings where traditional equipment is simply too bulky or expensive. This has broad applications, from point-of-care diagnostics in a clinic to humanitarian deployments in the field.

A Sustainable Vision for the Future

Whether it's supporting a nurse in a busy hospital wing or empowering a clinician in a remote community, the goal is the same: use automation to enhance human capability, improve outcomes, and create a more sustainable system.

Our success in this mission is built on a proven roadmap. It’s not just about best-in-class engineering. It’s about deep stakeholder engagement, rigorous data analysis, and a mastery of operational change management.