A new $2 million Caregiver Artificial Intelligence (AI) Prize Competition announced recently by the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services (HHS) seeks to support caregivers giving direct care for older adults and people with disabilities through HHS’s Administration for Community Living (ACL).

While the effort seemingly favors innovations in AI to strengthen family caregivers, the AI Prize Competition will fund and recognize innovators developing tools that not only support family, friends, and the direct care workforce in providing safe, person-centered care at home, but also support employers by improving efficiency, scheduling, and training in the caregiving workforce, according to HHS.

Why it Matters to You

Does this competition matter to skilled nursing facilities, and other direct care staff in the long-term care setting? Ben Zimmer, the CEO and co-founder of AI workforce management innovator Veras, said it does.

“While the competition is focused heavily on home-based care, the workforce challenges are identical in skilled nursing and assisted living—so the implications absolutely carry over,” he said.

Zimmer notes that the caregiving workforce crisis is the #1 operational challenge for senior care providers today, with turnover, staff shortages, and rising acuity all top priority issues. HHS/ACL’s competition signals a federal acknowledgment that AI will be essential to stabilizing and supporting the direct care workforce.

“It’s one of the first major national programs specifically linking AI innovation to frontline caregiving,” he added.

For its part, Veras is focused on building AI tools aimed at the goals of supporting caregivers by improving workforce management, with a platform helping to reduce overtime, agency use, missed meals, and scheduling chaos, which directly affects caregiver stress.

“We really feel like operators who are not thinking about AI are already behind. This was all kind of new in 2024, but by this year we see more and more operators we’ve been talking to making plans for 2026 and 2027,” he said.

More to Come

The government’s competition is part of a movement within the senior care sector that sees AI shifting from “experimental” to “expected” as operators who adopt early will have major advantages in labor efficiency and retention, he says.

Federal interest signals that the industry should anticipate more funding, pilots, and incentives tied to AI-driven workforce tools, Zimmer said. In turn, operators should start assessing which labor processes are ready for AI augmentation: scheduling, call-off management, communication, training.

“Anything that reduces friction for caregivers—whether at home or in facilities—directly improves care. AI isn’t replacing the workforce; it’s supporting it. This competition highlights how urgent and important that support is,” he said.

Zimmer expects more public-private collaboration around AI in caregiving with the HHA/ACL competition, a sign that AI-enabled workforce tools are becoming a national priority.

For more information, read the ACL fact sheet at The Power of Caregivers for a Healthy America. And for updates on the competition, visit Caregiver AI Prize Competition page. In early 2026, ACL will release the prize competition on https://www.challenge.gov/.

Comments or questions? Contact Patrick Connole at pconnole@parkplacelive.com.