Kaiser Permanente Rolls Out Abridge’s AI Documentation Tool

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Dive Brief:

• Kaiser Permanente has adopted an artificial intelligence clinical documentation tool developed by Abridge in a bid to cut down physicians’ administrative work, the Oakland, California-based health system said Wednesday. 
• The product, which records conversations with patients and summarizes relevant medical details, is now available to clinicians across the nonprofit’s 40 hospitals and more than 600 medical offices in eight states and Washington, D.C. 
• Kaiser implemented the tool after testing and quality checks, including assessments by more than thousand clinicians across all markets, a spokesperson said. The product also requires patient consent to use, and clinicians will review notes before entering them in the medical record, according to a press release. 

Dive Insight: 

Clinical documentation is a popular use case for generative AI, a type of the technology that can be used to create new content like text or images, in healthcare.

A number of other companies have built products aimed at assisting providers take notes on patient visits, including Amazon, Oracle and Microsoft-owned Nuance Communications. 

Augmedix, another AI-backed clinical documentation firm, recently entered into a deal to be acquired and taken private by health data company Commure for about $139 million.

There’s also plenty of investor interest in startups leveraging AI. Abridge, which was founded in 2018, raised $150 million earlier this year. 

The company has also implemented its documentation tool at other health systems. This year, Abridge has announced partnerships with hospital operators like Sutter Health, the University of Vermont Health Network, MemorialCare and UCI Health. 

Developers of the technology argue AI notetaking assistants can help reduce clinicians’ heavy documentation burden — a long-term concern for providers who report spending large amounts of time on clinical notes and other administrative work, sometimes stretching into after-work hours.

Clinicians say it adds challenges for patients too. Nearly three-quarters of healthcare professionals say the time or effort needed to complete clinical documentation hampers patient care, according to a study published earlier this summer by the American Medical Informatics Association.

The latest rollout at Kaiser comes as technology developers, providers, regulators and lawmakers grapple with how to safely and ethically implement AI in the healthcare sector.

Experts argue that a too-rapid deployment could risk errors or increase bias, potentially worsening health equities. 

The federal government has also taken notice. The HHS recently underwent a major reorganization of its technology functions, placing oversight of AI under the newly renamed Assistant Secretary for Technology Policy and Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology.