Speaker 0: At athenahealth, we know your ambulatory practice wants healthier, a healthier business, healthier care teams, and healthier patients. But the complexities of modern health care tech make it hard for you and your care teams to focus on what matters most? That's where athenahealth can help. Our AI native all in one solutions reduce administrative burdens, streamline billing and payments, and deliver critical insights when clinicians need it most. That means fewer clicks, more time for patients, and stronger bottom lines.

Practicing medicine is complex, but running a practice can be that much simpler with athenahealth. See how simpler is healthier@athenahealth.com.

Speaker 1: Hello, everyone. This is Scott King with the Becker's Healthcare podcast. Thrilled today to be joined by doctor Marcus Speaker, associate chief medical information officer with the Carlinian Clinic. Doctor Speaker, how are you doing today? I'm

Speaker 2: doing great. Thanks, Scott.

Speaker 1: Thanks so much for joining us. You know, we have a lot of big topics, some trendy things to address here in health care. But before we get started, I was wondering if you could please tell us a little bit about your background.

Speaker 2: Sure. I've been in health care IT now for close to twenty years. Started started out here at at Carilion, and did a, a medical informatics fellowship back in the, in the mid two thousands. That was after, family medicine training. So, family medicine board certified and also then, along the way, picked up a certification in clinical informatics, helped with our with our EPIC implementation, and then have, continued to to stay on and and work to optimize, our EPIC solution and have worked in, clinical decision support, work through meaningful use, you know, and and kind of all the changes that have taken place over the past couple decades.

And and now most recently, have been leading our Ambient Scribe rollout, across the organization. So lots of, lots of fun things over the over the past couple decades that we have seen.

Speaker 1: Absolutely. I appreciate you sharing all that background info. And I'm definitely gonna ask you about some of those areas in this conversation. But the first thing I want to ask you about, you know, our research tells us that nearly half of medical practices reported using AI in some capacity last year, and it remains a key topic, obviously, now for health IT leaders. From your perspective, what are the use cases that are making a difference right now, and how are you leveraging them in your organization?

Speaker 2: Yeah. It's a great it's a great question, and, certainly, I'll I'll attack it, from two different perspectives. So their the perspective of the physician or the or the frontline clinician and the the things that, that those clinicians are doing in in AI. And and probably three things bubble up. Certainly, the one that it that has everyone talking these days is the AmbientScribe technology, and, you know, the the ability to to walk in and and have a conversation with a patient to to set your phone down, press a button, record the entire conversation, have your notes written, that has been, the first major positive game changer, I I think, for our physicians in a long time.

And so I have, I have physicians, APPs coming up to me, telling me about how, impactful the the AmbientScribe technology has been, on their practice, getting them home, getting home on time, getting their notes done on time, not having to work, as much, at night or on weekends. So incredible impact there. So I think that's probably the the biggest one. But we are also seeing inroads into some of the augmented responses around, in basket, when patients have questions, that, through the patient portal coming coming in, being able to take the the conversation, and create a draft response for the, for whomever is responding to the to the message. Again, it helps, helps with efficiency, and in some cases, helps with tone, helps make those those responses a little more a little more pleasant and and patient friendly.

And so, that has been a a a large success. And then finally, a newer piece of technology that we have rolled out in the in the generative AI space around node summarization. So being able to, pull up a patient chart, for a patient that I'm seeing today and see a summary of everything that has taken place, you know, in the in the past six months or since the last time that patient was in to see me. Gives me the ability to, to kind of get all those those really important points. And and then if there's something in that, summary that I wanna drill into a little bit more, being able to, to click on some of the annotations and go back to the notes, where, where the generative AI found where it surfaced the information from so I can dig in deeper.

And so we're seeing that, catch on. But but, really, kind of these game changers, for our clinicians. Now that's on the clinician side. Now the other, the other hat that I I wear is on the IT side, and so we are seeing, generative AI, through the business applications. So our application analysts, our solution architects, our project managers, all using generative AI to help, put together project plans, help craft, emails, help craft patient education.

So being able to to take information, at whatever educational level you you wanna put together and then have the generative AI rewrite that at a at a sixth grade level, or at a fifth grade level or or to whatever target audience, you're looking for. So gaining efficiencies in in those spaces. Obviously, that's not, those are not the clinical applications, but, other other areas that we are are using generative AI across the system. So, just a a variety of of use cases.

Speaker 1: Yeah. It's definitely a variety. We, you know, we hear a lot about the note taking sounds like a simple use, but it really does free up clinicians and physician. It it it frees up so much time and makes things more efficient just to, you know, gather what's going on with the patient and really make the most of that time with the patient. And then hearing about how you're able to adjust it for, you know, different people at different levels, I I think that's just phenomenal and just just tends to lead to great patient care.

So, yeah, wonderful use cases. And as we continue to see virtual care expand, from AI enabled tools and remote monitoring to broader digital health platforms, introducing new technology always, you know, brings challenges. So what advice do you have for leaders navigating everything from governance to patient engagement? And can you share an example of how your organization has balanced innovation with some operational constraints?

Speaker 2: Yeah. I think, at a at a high level, having having a good governance process, is is going to be absolutely key for organizations. And in that in that governance process, making sure that that that at least some of the people that are are engaged really have a more a deeper understanding in terms of how AI and generative AI work, some of the the issues that can be found, and, obviously, both both positive and negative. I also think, at that at that high level, making sure at least in the in the near term for most applications, that organizations are are looking for solutions to problems that they have. There are there are a large number of, generative and and other AI companies that have, some really interesting solutions to problems that we never knew that we had.

And so, having conversations with, with these companies, trying to trying to figure out if they're a good fit for us, we have every day talking to to different leaders around around the company about something new and exciting that they that they saw that, you know, may maybe is not the the best fit in the in the short term because, it really is not addressing a a problem that we currently have. And so so really, trying to figure out what problems are you trying to solve and then having conversations with with those IT areas that that can help solve the problem rather than rather than putting in the the new and and bright shiny piece.

Speaker 1: No. I I think it's a great great question to to start from. And also want to ask, how are you seeing recent legislation, both state and federal, affect health care organizations and health care IT specifically? Have you had to adjust strategies in response?

Speaker 2: We we have. And and probably the the, the the biggest thing that that we're looking at right now, involves payment. And what, you know, looking out into the future and how is how is reimbursement going to change, trying to to figure out, what that looks like, over the next couple years, especially around, the the governmental programs, Medicare, Medicaid. We have a a large Medicare and Medicaid population, within with our clinic that makes us a little bit different than, you know, some of our some of the other health systems a little farther north and and east that are have a majority of a private payer system. So, trying to figure out, what that's going to look like.

And, and so scrutinizing our IT spend. So making sure that that the systems that we have in place are truly needed. We have a a number of legacy systems, our older systems that we're looking at that we have, recently determined that we could, with our core systems, we can do maybe 80 to 90% of what the the specialty system or the third party system can do. And so we're looking at moving away from some of these third party systems that we have had for a number of years, moving back into our core system and really, beefing up in our epic implementation. And and so again, some of the, some of those other core systems, which, results in, savings and puts us in a better place as we look to to weather some of the the headwinds that are that are coming.

Certainly, in the in the telehealth arena, looking very carefully at what's going to happen with telehealth, telehealth reimbursement and yeah. So trying to keep our our finger on that pulse so we can be reactive, because we, wanna wanna keep those margins at a at a safe place.

Speaker 1: So for my last question, doctor speaker, you you you've covered so much in terms of AI and and emerging technology and some great use cases. But if you had to kinda zero in on one top piece of advice for health care leaders as they prepare for further advancements in technology and and rising demands for care, what would that be?

Speaker 2: Yeah. Great great question. I and I think that goes back to what I said earlier. Make sure that you're focused on, your the the health system or the or the organization's strategy, understanding what your what your problems and your goals are, and then layering in the appropriate technology to to help maximize those goals. There's a lot of really fun, exciting, cool things that that people are are showcasing from a technology standpoint, but really making sure that, that the technology that you're putting in, is going to help solve those those core problems that, and and align with core strategy.

Speaker 1: I think that's a great piece of advice. And thank you so much for a great conversation, doctor Speaker. I look forward to working with you again soon.

Speaker 2: Absolutely. Sounds sounds great. Thanks, Scott.

Speaker 0: At athena Health, we know your ambulatory practice wants healthier, a healthier business, healthier care teams, and healthier patients. But the complexities of modern healthcare tech make it hard for you and your care teams to focus on what matters most. That's where athenahealth can help. Our AI native all in one solutions reduce administrative burdens, streamline billing and payments, and deliver critical insights when clinicians need it most. That means fewer clicks, more time for patients, and stronger bottom lines.

Practicing medicine is complex, but running a practice can be that much simpler with athenahealth. See how simpler is healthier at athenahealth.com.