Kaiser Permanente, the nation’s largest nonprofit, integrated health system, has joined the many other health systems around the country working with vendor Abridge’s AI-based assisted clinical documentation tool. The health system’s venture capital arm also is one of the investors in the company.
Pittsburgh-based Abridge’s Series B raise of $30 million was led by Spark Capital. The round also included existing investor Bessemer Venture Partners, as well as CVS Health Ventures, Kaiser Permanente Ventures, Lifepoint Health, Mayo Clinic, SCAN Group, UC Investments (University of California) and the American College of Cardiology. Last year, the company said the investment would support large-scale health system rollouts and accelerate product advances.
The tool is now available to doctors and other clinicians at Kaiser Permanente’s 40 hospitals and more than 600 medical offices in eight states and the District of Columbia. Powered by ambient listening technology from Abridge, the solution supports doctors and other clinicians with securely capturing clinical notes during visits with patients and helps them remain focused on talking with patients rather than on documentation or administrative tasks.
In rolling out Abridge, Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente joins a growing lists of large health system customers including UVM Health Network in Vermont, UChicago Medicine, Sutter Health, Yale New Haven Health System, UCI Health, Emory Healthcare, The University of Kansas Health System, and UPMC.
“For the past year, Kaiser Permanente has worked with Abridge on the largest implementation to date of the safe and effective use of ambient listening technology in the United States,” said Desiree Gandrup-Dupre, senior vice president of Care Delivery Technology Services at Kaiser Permanente, in a statement. “At Kaiser Permanente, we have a long history of successfully deploying proven technologies on a broad scale, as we continue to provide health care and services when, how, and where our patients need it.”
By using the assisted clinical documentation tool, doctors and clinicians at Kaiser Permanente can spend more time understanding the needs of their patients and actively involving their patients in care decisions. The assisted clinical documentation tool uses AI to securely summarize relevant medical information from spoken, natural conversations. Kaiser Permanente implemented the tool after testing and conducting quality checks, with patient privacy and preference in mind. The tool requires patient consent, and doctors and clinicians will review the clinical notes before entering them into a patient’s medical record.
“Our physicians strive to make every interaction with patients matter and work to establish a good rapport with our members so they know they are understood and heard,” said Ramin Davidoff, M.D., executive medical director and chair of the board with the Southern California Permanente Medical Group, in a statement. “By reducing administrative tasks, we’re making it easier for our physicians to focus on patients and foster an environment where they can provide effective communication and transparency while meeting the individual needs of each patient who comes to them for care. Creating space for the patient and the physician connection is what inspired us to implement this technology. And we hope that those connections and improved efficiencies will help with the sustainability of the practice of medicine for many doctors.”
