It should come as no surprise that a staggering 84 percent of healthcare providers have increased their budget for artificial intelligence in the last year. With organizations reporting up to 91 percent cost savings, it’s easy to see why AI use in healthcare shows no signs of slowing down.
However, it’s not state-of-the art medical procedures that are seeing the bulk of investment, but rather back-office functions that are being injected with sophisticated technology to cut down on cumbersome paperwork and time-consuming administrative tasks.
To find out the true extent of AI investment, ABBYY commissioned Sapio Research to carry out a survey of healthcare providers across the US, as well as Germany, France, and the UK.
It revealed that 59 percent of organizations in the US had introduced AI into their processes in the last 12 months, with an average spend of $300,000. Now let’s look at the reported impact of that:
Higher Patient Satisfaction
According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, one of the biggest burdens for Americans today is healthcare costs, with half of US adults finding it difficult to afford them.
AI is helping to bridge this financial gap by allowing more affordable and better access to care. The study revealed that just under a third (32 percent) of healthcare leaders reported reduced prices for services. In addition, more than half of respondents (52 percent) believe investment in AI led to faster delivery of care as well as higher quality service (43 percent).
With better patient care and satisfaction remaining a number one priority for healthcare leaders in 2024, it’s important to realize the benefits of technology and the advantage of a digital first approach.
Specialized AI solutions are addressing specific medical challenges such as disease diagnosis, treatment planning, and care management – all leading to a better experience for the patient. Non-profit cancer treatment center Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, for example, was able to accelerate and improve access to critical patient information by digitizing health records using purpose-built AI to provide secure and real-time online availability. For cancer patients, this is invaluable for alleviating stress during the treatment process.
AI is also proving to be transformative in helping patients see a specialist sooner. Currently only 54 percent of faxed referrals result in a scheduled appointment, leading to delays in treatment, diminished outcomes, and overall lower utilization of available health services. Automating this process with AI allows referrals to be digitally transferred to electronic health records while cutting out arduous manual data entry, faxing and costly errors. One major healthcare provider who implemented AI in referral management is now processing 90 percent of referrals without any human intervention. Not only has it led to better patient service, but it also enabled immense cost savings, – a necessary priority for providers striving to maintain sustainable operations.
Happier Employees
Employees using AI for administrative duties range from appointment schedulers to emergency room staff and physicians, while tasks include patient onboarding, retrieval of patients’ records and referral management and authorization.
Employees using the technology reported feeling less stressed (43 percent), happier (67 percent) and having a better work-life balance (37 percent), contributing to two-thirds of staff feeling that they were carrying out more interesting and valuable work – leaving boring and mundane tasks such as data entry to their AI-powered digital assistants. In addition, 57 percent of healthcare providers said they have benefited from an increase in staff retention since the introduction of the technology. With burnout and a major skills shortage in the industry proving to be major barriers for many organizations, I believe this is a significant gain.
Raising the Bottom-Line
As explained above, referral management leakage is expensive, costing hospitals between $821k to $971k per physician per year, according to Chime-Cerner research. Mitigating this expense is just one example of how AI can improve the bottom line.
Our survey respondents were quick to acknowledge that their investment in AI was money well spent. 91 percent reported ROI equal to or greater than their initial investment while 52 percent reported 3x the ROI.
Cost savings also extended to employee workload, with half of healthcare leaders reporting increased productivity and improved efficiency for less hours spent on labor.
Even in back-office areas like accounts payable, one organization experienced huge savings by cutting invoice processing times in half – with AI taking care of 700 invoices an hour.
As for the future, there’s no doubt that AI and digital transformation will continue to be a priority in healthcare settings across the globe. Over a third (35 percent) of survey respondents told our researchers they have a 3–5-year plan for implementing AI, while 32 percent have a two-year plan.
The main revenue generating priorities for the next 12 months are customer onboarding (44 percent), accounts payable automation (37 percent) and improving customer service (37 percent).
Deloitte’s 2024 Outlook for Healthcare report cited that adopting new technologies while under sustained financial pressure is the biggest challenge for healthcare providers in the year ahead, yet they believe we are likely to see ‘some remarkable innovations’ as organizations adapt to the new environment. I concur with this conclusion. While AI implementation might seem a daunting project to undertake, starting with easy-to-use purpose-built AI for automating document centric tasks can be a beneficial and rewarding first step.
The author, Slavena Hristova, is Director of Product Marketing at ABBYY, a global intelligent automation company.