The State of AI for Home Care Agencies
Introduction
Home care agencies operate in an industry shaped by growing demand, workforce shortages, rising administrative complexity, and increasing expectations from caregivers, clients, and regulators. Providers seeking to balance quality of care with operational efficiency are evaluating how AI (Artificial Intelligence) can support their functions, but the rapid pace of innovation has introduced new questions around implementation, oversight, training, privacy, and the practical realities of integrating AI into day-to-day workflows.
Decision-makers responsible for home care operations management applications are exploring new capabilities, ranging from scheduling and documentation support to caregiver communication, client engagement, and operational decision-making. This survey examines these trends and endeavors to address the following questions:
- How extensively are home care agencies embracing AI?
- What does success look like?
- What barriers are slowing adoption?
- What does the future look like for AI adoption?
The following report, sponsored by AxisCare, is based on a survey of more than 400 home care agency leaders in Director, VP, C-level, or equivalent roles at a home care agency in the United States. All participants had direct responsibility for application strategy, budgets, selection, and/or implementation of their agency’s home care operations management solutions.
Key Findings
AI Adoption Is a Work-In-Progress at Home Care Agencies
- 91% are using or planning to use AI for home care operations management
- Only 15% are fully mature, while 30% say teams are using regularly, and 29% are evaluating possibilities
- AI adoption is driven primarily by the need to learn about the implications of AI (71%), desire to improve client and caregiver experiences (70%), and requirements to manage costs (68%)
AI Is Already Delivering Benefits
- 92% are confident AI will deliver value to home care agencies
- 94% of AI users experienced benefits overall, with 64% reporting cost reduction, and 59% reporting improved decision making
- 91% report AI can help them address their agency’s growth challenges
Home Care Agencies Must Remain Human First
- 57% are concerned that AI may cause loss of human connection with clients
- Agency leaders do not agree on the role of AI for caregiver and client communication
Cultural & Technology Barriers Must Be Overcome To Achieve the Full AI Value
- 76% face barriers to their AI adoption
AI Adoption Is a Work-In-Progress at Home Care Agencies
AI Is Widely Used, but Maturity Varies Greatly
There has been significant hype about the use of AI in all areas of life, with predictions about the potential for investment, job losses, and business transformation dominating headlines across industries. To separate hype from reality, we first wanted to understand if home care agencies are actually using AI for their operations management. The answer is a resounding “Yes!”
Most home care agencies (91%) are investing in AI. This number includes 87% that are actively using AI today, with an additional 4% who have plans to adopt AI capabilities in the future. The adoption of AI is real and is happening now.
However, when we drill into details, we find a far more nuanced view of AI adoption, with its use for home care operations covering a huge range of levels of use and types of technology.
To gain a deeper understanding of AI maturity, we provided participants with the following categories and asked them to indicate which best described the maturity of their agency’s current AI adoption.
• Non-existent — we are not using AI in any way
• Evaluating — we are considering possible ways to use AI
• Piloting — individual employees are working with AI to identify use cases
• Adopting — teams across the agencies are regularly using AI
• Transforming — reimagining workflows and changing the shape of teams and tasks
The data shows that AI adoption exists across every stage. There are technology-forward agencies that have thoroughly embraced AI, and indicate that they are transforming their workflows, teams, and tasks, but this is a relatively small group (15%). There are even fewer agencies (8%) that put themselves at the other end of the spectrum and aren’t thinking about or planning for AI in any way. That leaves most agencies (77%) actively working to understand and implement AI. This includes a mix of agencies in the evaluating (29%), piloting (18%), and adopting (30%) stages of adoption.
AI Adoption for Home Care Agencies Has a Wide Range of Drivers
Home care agency leaders report three primary drivers for their adoption of AI technology. The motivation to improve cost structures is very common (68%), as is a desire to improve client and caregiver experiences (70%). In contrast to these measurable and typical business drivers, the sense that AI is the future, which is creating a compelling need to learn, is reported just as frequently (71%). Many participants were passionate about specific drivers at their organization and took the time to write in other answers, including calling out motivators around efficiency and accuracy improvements, while multiple agency leaders expressed a strategic goal to be perceived as a leader in AI for home care.
Enterprise agencies report a greater range of pressures for AI adoption. These agencies are much more likely to face pressure to keep up with other agencies adopting AI (42% vs. only 26% at smaller agencies). It also appears that enterprise agencies are more likely to have AI evangelists in their organization as they have higher organic adoption by frontline staff (32% vs. 18% at small agencies) and more top-down pressure (17% vs. 3% at small agencies). The exception to this pattern was cost management, which was reported at the same level across all agency sizes (67% for small and 69% for both mid-size and enterprise).
AI Is Already Delivering Benefits
Leaders Are Confident About the Value of AI
Technology innovation inevitably presents adoption challenges, but the overwhelming feeling given across the data that we captured in this study was one of confidence and excitement. Throughout the questions that we asked, agency leaders were consistently positive about both the current value received and the potential for even more benefits.
When agency leaders were asked a very general question about their personal opinion on the value of AI, confidence was high. The vast majority (93%) said they were confident that AI would deliver value to their industry, including more than half (53%) that characterized their feelings as “very confident.”
Confidence in AI Increases With Maturity & Experience
Often, an exciting new technology follows what Gartner has termed the “hype cycle” when initial excitement fades with real-life experience. AI for home care providers is not following the hype cycle.
This research clearly demonstrates that AI benefits consistently increase with experience and maturity. This is a clear indicator that there is real value in AI investments — not just hype that doesn’t deliver in real life. A remarkable 93% of agency leaders in the most mature “transforming” stage report being very confident in the overall value of AI across the industry.
We see a similar pattern when we ask agency leaders to characterize their emotions about AI for home care operations. Most (81%) indicated positive emotions, including 44% that chose “excited” and 37% that selected “curious.” As agency leaders gain more maturity and experience with AI, they are consistently more likely to express excitement about the technology.
AI Users Are Already Seeing the Benefit for Their Agencies
The high levels of confidence reported by agency leadership are not just a feeling. Among agencies actively using AI, the vast majority (94%) report benefits from that use. The most frequently reported advantages of using AI come from gaining efficiencies that reduce costs (64%) and improving strategic decision-making (59%). More than a third of agencies report that their use of AI has helped to increase revenue (36%).
Very importantly, many AI users report that their caregivers have benefited. This happens when administrative tasks are simplified to allow focus on care delivery (48%), and AI capabilities for proactive interactions around scheduling and changes that minimize frustration and churn (39%). This is particularly important given the well-documented challenges of recruiting and retaining caregivers at home care agencies.
The likelihood of benefits does increase with the maturity of AI use. Among the 6% reporting that their agency hasn’t benefited, most are still in the early evaluation stage. Agencies in the transforming stage of their AI adoption are far more likely to report all types of benefits, including simplifying caregiver administration tasks (59%) and minimizing caregiver churn (45%).
Home Care Agencies Are Growing — AI Will Help
The home care industry is a growth business. Almost all (99.5%) report that their agency will grow over the next five years. This includes a remarkable two-thirds (65%) who report that they expect their agency to grow aggressively over the next five years, characterizing expected growth as “exponential” or “strong.”
This expected growth is not without challenges. Most agencies (85%) report that their growth will be limited by various market forces. Concerns around caregiving staff top the list of barriers to growth, including difficulties with recruiting (52%), retention (45%), and scheduling (37%).
The good news is that leaders see AI as being able to help with their agency’s specific barriers to growth. We presented the items each participant identified as barriers to their agency’s growth and asked whether they thought AI could help address those issues. Most (91%) identified at least one of the areas where they were experiencing growth challenges as something that AI could help with.
Home Care Agencies Must Remain Human First
Leaders Are Concerned About the Potential of AI To Impact Human Connections
While agency leaders are very positive about the impact of AI, they are realistic about possible problems. Most (86%) have concerns and want to ensure their agency adopts AI in a way that aligns with their values and operational environment. Participants reported worries that include the potential for errors (57%), the possibility that caregivers or clients could reject use (42%), the lack of ability to implement effective security and privacy guardrails (30%), and more.
Topping the list of concerns is the worry that their agency’s human connection with clients could be affected (57%).
AI for Client & Caregiver Interactions Receives Mixed Response
When agency leaders are asked for their opinions about caregiver and client AI interactions, there is no agreement. When asked how open their agency’s caregivers are toward using AI, a minority (20%) gave a negative response, while only a third (33%) reported that their caregivers would be positive with AI interactions. The more typical response (47%) was to balance the AI and human experiences by selecting the neutral response.
We asked a separate question about opinions on using AI to interact with clients. In this question, we decided not to offer a neutral option in order to attempt to force a clear response, but the results ended up being fairly evenly split. There were almost as many participants who reported they were worried (44%) as those that were pleased (49%). A meaningful number of participants (7%) took the time to write in their thoughts rather than being pigeonholed into a purely positive or negative answer, expressing a need to balance the speed and tasks where AI would be beneficial, while identifying areas where human involvement was necessary. Some commenters expected that, over time, AI interactions would become more acceptable to both caregivers and clients.
Interestingly, enterprise agencies were much more likely to be positive about AI for both caregiver and client interactions than their counterparts at agencies servicing fewer clients.
While the data is mixed, the takeaway is clear. AI has the potential to be very good for client and caregiver interactions, but human relationships will continue to matter. Agencies must ensure that human contact remains a key priority within the overall AI strategy.
Cultural & Technology Barriers Must Be Overcome To Achieve the Full AI Value
Challenges To AI Adoption Are Ubiquitous
Any change in how an organization operates creates issues as teams evolve to adopt new ways of working. The adoption of AI for home care agency operations presents many of the classic challenges that arise when a new technology is introduced into an existing environment. Additionally, the speed at which AI technology is evolving is exceptional, so specific strategies to quickly respond are critical to fully capture potential benefits. Agencies must be prepared for the inevitable hiccups as they move through the stages of their AI adoption journey and be ready to act quickly to resolve problems.
The first step is to understand what problems are likely to occur. Three-quarters (76%) report that their agency is facing barriers that slow their adoption of AI. The most frequent issues reported cover a range of areas, including:
- Cultural: 41% report that they are dealing with general concern about the ethics and morals of AI technology, and 30% reporting employees are hesitant to change the way they work. In addition, many participants took the time to write in other cultural concerns and reiterated worries about client and caregiver experiences and maintaining a personal touch that this report examined in more detail above.
- Technology: There is a need for improvements in existing AI technology with 27% citing concerns about privacy and 22% not seeing value from current AI technology.
- Time: Lack of time to evaluate the potential of AI was also cited as a concern (19%). This was reflected in comments referring to a lack of knowledge beyond the basics and frustration about the lack of time to effectively learn and evaluate existing options.
Fortunately, it is not typical for leadership to be the barrier, with a small number (15%) reporting that leadership at their agency is not supportive.
Survey Methodology & Participant Demographics
An online survey was sent to independent databases of home care agency leaders in May 2026. A total of 403 qualified participants completed the survey. All participants worked in a leadership position (Director, VP, C-level, or equivalent) at a home care agency in the United States. All had direct responsibility for application strategy, budget approval, selection, and/or implementation of their agency’s home care operations management solutions. Participants represented a wide range of roles and agency sizes. Due to rounding, certain graph options may not add up to exactly 100%.
About Dimensional Research
Dimensional Research provides actionable market research for innovative companies. We partner with our clients to deliver actionable information that reduces risks, increases customer satisfaction, and grows the business. Our researchers are experts in the technology and business models used by modern businesses and their customers. For more information, visit dimensionalresearch.com.
About AxisCare
AxisCare is the leading all-in-one operating system for single and multi-location home care agencies, serving more than 4,000 home care agencies across all 50 states and seven countries. Built for Private Pay, Skilled Care, IDD, Medicaid, and VA programs, AxisCare unifies scheduling, care delivery, compliance, billing, and revenue cycle management into a connected System of Action across every stage of care. Through automation, operational intelligence, and a suite of AI-powered capabilities, AxisCare helps agencies streamline operations, strengthen financial performance, accelerate growth, and stay focused on what matters most: delivering exceptional care in the home. For more information, visit axiscare.com.
