How is WellSpan Health Enhancing AI Care?
AI agent Ana already handles more than 160,000 patient calls per month across WellSpan's network, the company said.
On July 30, WellSpan Health, the Pennsylvania-based health system, announced an expanded multi-year partnership with Hippocratic AI, a company that builds generative voice AI agents for health care.
According to WellSpan Health, the agreement moves the partnership from individual use cases to a platform-wide commitment across inbound calls, outbound outreach, ambulatory care, and inpatient settings. The expanded partnership also launches a formal co-development program between the two organizations, the company said. As part of this program, Hippocratic AI is placing a dedicated team of clinical, engineering, and deployment specialists on WellSpan's York, Pennsylvania campus to build new AI tools directly with WellSpan staff.
Roxanna Gapstur, Ph.D., R.N., president and CEO of WellSpan Health, said the expansion reflects the health system's approach to AI adoption. "The future of health care will be shaped by organizations that build the culture, governance and clinical capabilities to harness artificial intelligence responsibly at scale," Gapstur said. "Our expanded partnership with Hippocratic AI is an investment in the future of care."
Munjal Shah, co-founder and CEO of Hippocratic AI, said the partnership marks a shift for the company. "WellSpan was the first health system to partner with us on a vision for transforming patient care, and together we proved what responsible, generative AI can do at scale," Shah said.
New Clinical AI Tools
According to WellSpan, the partnership builds on nearly two years of work between the two companies. Their joint AI agent, called Ana, currently manages more than 160,000 patient calls per month and engages in more than 7,000 hours of conversation monthly, the company said. Patients can also interact with Ana on WellSpan Health's website for answers to frequently asked questions and information on doctors and locations.
Under the new agreement, WellSpan said it will expand Ana's responsibilities beyond scheduling and answering calls to include post-discharge follow-up and chronic disease check-ins. The first new workflow will focus on outreach to patients who have missed imaging appointments, according to the company. WellSpan said every new function added to Ana will go through a governance and safety review before deployment.
Beyond expanding Ana's current role, WellSpan said it will co-develop new products with Hippocratic AI. According to WellSpan, the health system is one of the first in the United States to formally co-develop next-generation clinical AI with Hippocratic AI. The health system will trial voice AI tools built to support clinicians during patient triage, the company said.
WellSpan will also test the Hippocratic AI Orchestrator, a new tool designed to help care teams track a patient's treatment plan and health history across providers, according to the company.
WellSpan said it intends for the partnership to serve as a model for how other health systems can move from isolated AI pilots to platform-wide deployment. Recently, WellSpan Health completed a 17-week migration of 300 applications and 7.5 petabytes of data to AWS, creating the foundation for AI across its clinical operations.
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Key Takeaways
- WellSpan Health expands partnership with Hippocratic AI for comprehensive AI integration across patient care.
- AI agent Ana handles over 160,000 patient calls monthly, enhancing communication efficiency.
- New co-development program aims to create innovative AI tools with dedicated teams on-site.
- Leadership emphasizes responsible AI adoption to transform healthcare delivery and improve patient experiences.
- Partnership signifies a commitment to harnessing AI's potential in a scalable, clinical environment.