Roberta Schwartz on Why 2026 Is the Year of Maturation for Houston Methodist

As chief innovation officer at Houston Methodist, Roberta Schwartz and her team are known for bringing digital-first ideas into health care spaces — from ambient voice technology that lightens providers’ documentation workload to medical grade wearables that continuously track patients’ vital signs.

But for 2026, she’s chosen a theme that’s less about disruption and more about deepening, strengthening and evolving.

Her word of the year: Maturation.

We sat down with Schwartz to explore why this theme matters now, how it reflects Houston Methodist’s evolution into an intelligent health care system and what maturation means for the future — not only for Houston Methodist, but for health care systems everywhere.

Why “maturation”?

Schwartz describes maturation as the natural next step after years of steady, iterative progress.

“We’ve spent the last four years ideating, piloting and accelerating on the initial set of bets we made for a hospital of the future,” says Schwartz. “2026 is the year we take the strongest of those innovations, widen their application and help them become more integrated into operations.”

Importantly, Schwartz emphasizes that maturation is not the end of innovation — it’s the evolution that gives innovation staying power.

She cites Houston Methodist’s expansion of ambient AI as a prime example: a 36‑room pilot that was recently scaled to more than 200 operating rooms after early results showed a 15% increase in surgical volume without added staff or space — among other striking results. The initiative has already matured in many ways, such as ‘time boost’ for pushing out open spots, initial pilots in endoscopy and interventional radiology and sophisticated tracking boards in the operating rooms.

“We’ve demonstrated how intelligent infrastructure drives operational efficiency and access to care,” says Schwartz. “Now, our focus shifts to the transformation of this technology. For instance, how do we take what we’ve learned about ambient AI and create ‘Smart Spaces’ around our entire system.”

It’s this evolution that’s driving the new roadmap, coined 10 Bets for the Intelligent Health Care System, that Schwartz and her team announced at many conferences last fall.

“Maturation is all about thoughtful expansion of innovation that already has clear, systemwide impact and knowing what has the capability of maturing on a three-year horizon,” she adds. “It’s how we solidify long‑term value. We don’t want to waste time in areas that aren’t yet ready to add significant ROI to our health care system.”

Shared learning and collaboration are key

Schwartz’s dual role — both leading innovation and serving as CEO of Houston Methodist Hospital — means she is a leader who knows that technology must function in real clinical environments and scenarios. It’s why Houston Methodist’s DIOP (digital innovation obsessed people) team is made up of operators and IT professionals alike. It’s this synergy that allows for speedy implementation and adoption, with no time wasted on products that operators can’t use.

“New technology only succeeds if our clinicians find it to be practical, adoptable and culturally aligned with how they work,” she explains. “Maturation means designing with real workflows in mind.”

That operational grounding shapes how Houston Methodist pilots and scales digital tools. But collaboration extends far beyond the health care system. Schwartz credits industry partners with accelerating the maturity of many emerging tools.

“While piloting their technologies, we share back with these companies what we’ve learned in our real-world clinical scenarios,” Schwartz adds. “This helps mature the technology faster and in more practical, reliable ways.”

She notes that this “sweat equity” doesn’t just benefit Houston Methodist. It lifts the entire health care ecosystem.

Maturation isn’t just a technology journey — it’s a people and culture journey

Change management is an essential ingredient of innovation maturity, not an afterthought.

“Our workforce has grown tremendously in digital fluency, and we need to empower them even further — evolving processes, workflows and behaviors,” Schwartz adds.

This means building adoption pathways, strengthening training and ensuring teams understand not only how tools work, but why they matter.

Ultimately, Schwartz wants innovations to feel expected, not experimental.

“Innovation isn’t just about what’s next,” she adds. “It’s about making what’s next truly work, so our people are not only excited to try it but come to rely on it today, and the next day and then the next day after that.”