Pieces Blog

The promise of AI in healthcare is very real and AI is accomplishing more than ever before. The advancements are no longer just automation, they are helping clinicians with the care and treatment of patients. This exciting progress is why Pieces recently convened an industry roundtable to discuss the potential of AI to make a major impact on the day-to-day work of clinicians. The panelists discussed AI’s critical role in re-empowering clinicians to focus more on patients and less on administrative tasks and the opportunity for AI to help physicians to realize the joy of practicing medicine again.

Here are 4 things to know from the discussion – and their implications for the future of healthcare:

1. AI can transform this difficult decade into the most exciting decade yet: “One of the most exciting areas for me, coming from a clinical world, is how advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) will help reduce the burden on medical professionals,” said Mark Michalski, MD, Worldwide Head Healthcare and Life Sciences for AI and machine learning (ML), Amazon and Amazon Web Services (AWS).“Our providers have had a tremendously difficult two years, and beyond the stress of increasing patient volumes, they are also grappling with alert and documentation fatigue. An exciting near-term goal is to streamline repetitive charting activity with predictive AI – and the ultimate goal is to modernize clinical documentation and charting activities altogether. This will free up medical practitioners’ time from critical yet repetitive tasks, and help them focus on patient care.”
2. Physicians are now ready to embrace AI: My discussion with physician colleagues is that they are hungry for advances in AI to be applied to their work to make their lives easier and their patient’s outcomes even better,” said Ruben Amarasingham, MD, Founder and CEO, Pieces. “There is enormous complexity and information in medicine and many physicians would like tools that make it easier to do their work, manage routine items, and reduce cognitive overload similar to what they see their smartphones doing in their lives outside of medicine.”
3. AI can also be a vital piece of staff retention strategy: “The NHS has recognized that more staff are leaving the field than ever before and has committed to taking action – and staff retention is a top priority,” said Jim Ritchie, MD, Program Director Digital Control Center, Consultant Renal Physician and CCIO at Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust. “If we can apply AI to enable a better staff experience that is less about administrative tasks and more about safely looking after patients, it will make a difference. Similarly, if AI can help clinicians to increase the efficiency of their work with automation, they will be able to look after more patients which is a win for both organizational efficiency and our staff’s quality of their working experience.”
4. The future is bright for AI as it becomes smarter and smarter:  “I’m looking forward to technology like AI and machine learning allowing clinicians to spend their critical thinking time on a patients’ medical issues,” said Pallabi Sanyal-Dey, MD, FHM, Director of Client Services, Inpatient Beds, LeanTaaS.  “Giving clinical care the space that it needs, without the clutter of administrative tasks, will free up brain space to think about our patients better.”

Dr. Amarasingham agrees. He believes that future iterations of AI systems will become more anticipatory. “AI will become a clinically holistic assistant to physicians, like having a really great intern to help with things,” he said.

To learn more about the virtual roundtable, check out the full recap in our press release here.