Chicago-based Northwestern Medicine plans to deploy generative AI-powered clinical documentation from Microsoft across the health system and its Epic EHR.
Northwestern said Aug. 15 it selected the Dragon Ambient eXperience, or DAX Copilot, from Microsoft subsidiary Nuance Communications as its enterprise ambient voice solution. The app records and transcribes patient visits before drafting a clinical note for the EHR. AI scribes have been increasingly popular in healthcare, with Nuance one of the top players in the market.
"We are already seeing the significant benefits of DAX Copilot as it is materially enhancing our ability to provide exceptional patient care by reducing the administrative burden on our physicians," Northwestern Medicine CIO Doug King said in a statement.
In piloting the technology, Northwestern physicians who used it during at least 50% of appointments saw an additional 11.3 patients per month, while users at Northwestern overall experienced a 24% drop in note time and a 17% decrease in "pajama time," or after-hours work.
Northwestern Medicine has 11 hospitals and over 200 locations across the Chicago area and northern Illinois.