Hospitals and health systems are finding considerable success with generative AI-powered clinical documentation tools.
As administrative burdens, particularly documentation tasks, weigh heavily on providers, AI-based scribes are rapidly gaining traction among healthcare organizations.
Initially piloted by several organizations in 2023, these AI scribes — designed to transcribe healthcare visits and draft clinical notes for EHRs — are now being rolled out on a broader scale across the industry.
For example, Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente is expanding the use of an AI-powered clinical documentation tool from startup Abridge to providers across its 40 hospitals and more than 600 medical offices.
This decision comes after the tool received positive feedback from both patients and clinicians during its testing phase at Renton, Wash.-based Washington Permanente Medical Group.
Similarly, Palo Alto, Calif.-based Stanford Health Care has expanded its AI tool, DAX Copilot, to thousands of physicians following successful pilots of various DAX versions since 2021.
Stanford plans to extend DAX to all ambulatory physicians and advanced practice providers through the end of this year and into early 2025.
"The goal here is to take some of the cognitive load off physicians," Stanford's applications chief Gary Fritz told Becker's. "And it seems to be doing that."
Administrative burdens, such as documentation, cost U.S. healthcare an estimated $1 trillion annually. These clinical tools offer a promising solution to reduce excessive EHR documentation and allow providers to spend more face time with their patients.
Rebecca Mishuris, MD, chief medical information officer at Mass General Brigham, echoed this sentiment.
"Over the years, we've tried various approaches to alleviate this burden," she told Becker's. "Ambient documentation was the first truly scalable solution that had the potential to reduce documentation burdens for our providers and alleviate some of the burnout they're experiencing."
Somerville, Mass.-based Mass General Brigham is also scaling its ambient documentation program to include more than 900 physicians and advanced practice providers. Initially, a proof of concept involved 20 clinicians and the results were promising enough to warrant a full-scale pilot with 400 providers. According to Dr. Mishuris, the demand from clinicians was so high that the health system decided to expand the program further.
"With more providers, we get more data, allowing us to see differences more clearly," Dr. Mishuris said. "We can identify which clinical specialties and practice patterns are most positively impacted by ambient documentation."