Inside DHITS 2026: The Ideas, Challenges and Opportunities Shaping Military Health
- Signature Performance
- 11 minutes ago
- 3 min read
The Defense Health Information Technology Symposium (DHITS) brings together leaders across government, industry, and the broader military health community to discuss the challenges and opportunities shaping the future of federal healthcare.
For our team, this year’s event provided an opportunity to listen, learn, and connect with the people working to advance healthcare delivery, technology, and operations across the Defense Health Agency and beyond. From emerging priorities and modernization efforts to conversations with customers and industry peers here are the Signature team's key takeaways and what they think is next for the future of military health.
Dawn Wierzbicki, Chief Business Development Officer, Federal
One of my biggest takeaways from DHITS was the emphasis on moving innovation from concept to meaningful adoption across the Military Health System. AI, automation, and data modernization were prominent themes, but the conversations consistently came back to how these capabilities can be implemented responsibly, integrated into existing environments, and translated into measurable operational impact.
I also heard a strong focus on partnership bringing together government, industry, and technology partners to solve mission-critical challenges rather than introducing technology for technology’s sake. That creates a meaningful opportunity for Signature to combine our deep understanding of federal healthcare operations with capabilities like WorkflowXM to streamline complex processes, reduce administrative burden, and improve performance. DHITS reinforced that our differentiator is not simply the technology we bring forward, but our ability to understand the mission and translate innovation into solutions that deliver measurable results.
Chris Woodhouse, SVP Innovation, Research and Development
One of my biggest takeaways from DHITS 2026 was the growing focus on the intersection of AI, orchestration, and security. Across conversations, I heard significant interest in using structured orchestration to connect disparate systems, apply AI capabilities, and collect critical data and informatics to create enterprise-wide visibility. This represents a significant opportunity for Signature's WorkflowXM platform that is designed to orchestrate workflows across systems, enable AI-driven activities, and turn disconnected processes and data into actionable visibility.
One of the most important challenges I heard around AI adoption was the need to clearly demonstrate the value of change. Organizations may understand that a problem exists, but without measurable evidence of the current state and a clear picture of the desired future state, it becomes difficult to build the case for transformation. As AI accelerates, security needs also become critical. For industry partners, that means security must be foundational to how solutions are designed, deployed, and brought into the military health environment.
Shasta Johnson, SVP Federal Business Development
My biggest takeaway from DHITS was that DHA is looking beyond stand-alone technology capabilities and toward mission-ready solutions that connect people, systems, data, and operational outcomes. Across the sessions and our industry discussions, the recurring priorities were responsible AI, interoperability, secure data use, workflow automation, and measurable improvements to readiness and healthcare administration.
Many discussions reinforced that Signature's WorkflowXM is best positioned is as an orchestration layer that can connect existing systems and enable end-to-end processes, particularly in revenue cycle, denials management, referral management, and care coordination. For Signature, the opportunity is to pair our federal healthcare and revenue cycle expertise with WorkflowXM to deliver practical, governed automation that reduces administrative burden while retaining human oversight where it matters.
DHITS 2026 reinforced an important theme: modernizing federal healthcare is about more than implementing new technology. It requires understanding the people, processes, data, and operational realities behind the systems. The conversations and insights our team brought back from DHITS will continue to inform how we think about the challenges facing federal health organizations and the solutions needed to address them. While the path to modernization may look different across programs and agencies, the opportunity remains the same: build a more connected, efficient, and resilient healthcare experience for those who serve and support our nation.
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