Epic Introduces AI Connectors to Link Healthcare Assistants With Third-Party Apps

Epic has introduced Connectors, a new capability that allows its artificial intelligence (AI) agents to access information and perform tasks through third-party applications. The technology will support the company’s patient-facing assistant Emmie, clinician assistant Art, revenue cycle and operations AI Penny, and custom AI agents developed by healthcare organizations through its Agent Factory platform.

Connecting AI Agents Across Healthcare Systems

Epic announced the capability on Wednesday ahead of its Open@Epic conference. Connectors are designed to help patients, clinicians, and administrative staff work across different applications without repeatedly switching between systems to retrieve information or complete tasks.

“The goal is to take what is sometimes a fragmented experience today, where patients, clinicians and healthcare system staff need to be going between multiple different systems or gathering data from multiple different places and bringing that experience together,” said Johnston Thayer, Epic’s vice president of health informatics, in an interview with Fierce Healthcare.

Epic outlined several potential uses for the technology. A Connector could retrieve an ambulance’s arrival time from an external application, allowing a hospital emergency department to prepare for the patient. A hospitalized patient could ask Emmie for a meal, with the assistant placing the order through the hospital’s dietary management application.

Emmie could also provide patients with hospital wayfinding instructions. For surgical teams, Epic could check an equipment application for information about the availability of assistive devices needed for a patient’s recovery.

Extending the Agent Factory Platform

Epic’s AI assistants already retrieve information from within its electronic health record (EHR) system. Connectors extend their capabilities to third-party applications, enabling the company’s AI tools to coordinate workflows involving multiple software systems.

According to Thayer, agents can use several Connectors to complete a workflow across different applications. One potential use case involves Emmie helping an older adult arrange a follow-up appointment when the person does not have access to transportation. While exploring transportation options, the agent could also retrieve information about the weather forecast. Agents could additionally gather relevant information from other healthcare systems.

Epic’s Agent Factory, introduced at its User Group Meeting in August, provides a platform for building, running, and monitoring AI agents that can reason and act across workflows. The platform launched with more than 100 pre-built AI features that healthcare organizations can adapt to their own policies, clinical protocols, and guidelines.

Developer Standards and Health System Oversight

Epic already connects with external capabilities through application programming interfaces (APIs). Connectors extend this approach to AI agents, using infrastructure designed for their operation across software applications.

The company plans to use the Model Context Protocol (MCP) initially as the standard for developing Connectors. Epic intends for third-party developers to build integrations, while individual healthcare organizations decide which ones to use.

Before enabling a Connector, health systems will be able to review its functions, the information it can access, and the changes it can make. Thayer said permissions remain under the control of each health system, whose security, legal, and compliance teams can assess proposed information flows before approving them.

Safety Measures and Planned Rollout

Epic said Connectors will not give its AI assistants new autonomous capabilities. Emmie, Art and Penny will continue operating under human-established protocols, human-in-the-loop design and individual health systems’ governance requirements.

Thayer said Epic regularly conducts thousands of test cases and evaluations to assess whether Emmie operates safely within established limits. The purpose of Connectors is to bring together additional information to support existing functions, rather than introduce new autonomous actions.

Epic plans to begin testing the technology with selected health system partners by the end of 2026. Developer-created Connectors are expected to become available through Epic Showroom in March 2027. The company will charge developers to distribute their integrations through the platform but has not disclosed pricing.

Potential Applications for Healthcare Technology Companies

Healthcare technology companies have identified possible applications in insurance coverage, prior authorization, claims management, patient wayfinding, and medication delivery information.

Availity CEO Russ Thomas said the technology could help reduce administrative complexity and improve information flow across healthcare processes. Gozio Health CEO Joshua Titus identified hospital wayfinding as a potential integration with Emmie, while VPL chief strategy and product officer Derrek Seif said connecting VPLRx with Epic’s AI tools could provide care teams with real-time medication delivery information.

Health system executives have also expressed interest in connecting Art with existing document management systems and linking Epic’s AI agents to IT ticketing applications. These integrations could allow agents to reference clinicians’ original requests when assisting IT teams with configuration changes.

Epic’s Connectors are designed to link its healthcare software with external applications, allowing AI assistants to access relevant information and carry out supported actions without requiring users to navigate multiple systems manually. The capability extends Epic’s existing interoperability work into AI-powered workflows, connecting digital assistants with tools that healthcare organizations already use.