The future is here, and it's being shaped by AI. From social media and entertainment to lectures at healthcare conferences, suddenly, AI is everywhere.
If you attended MedTrade 2024 in Dallas, you probably noticed the dramatic increase in AI's presence since 2023, with an entire category of vendors dedicated to AI solutions. Clinicians and business teams alike recognize that AI is going to be a critical part of their workflows, but many are unsure where to begin. This year, the Synthpop team has been on a mission to spread awareness and educate our colleagues, presenting CE-worthy information at ACHC, the Philadelphia Sleep Conference, FAHCS, ACMESA, and NEMEP events.
So, what's changed? Why has AI in healthcare surged to the forefront so quickly? This blog shares some insights from my experience and a conversation with Stanford Professor and Synthpop's Co-Founder, Jan Jannink.
The ChatGPT Effect
One of the key reasons AI has become so prevalent in healthcare is the spike in general awareness and public access. Technologies like ChatGPT have played a huge role in this shift. When OpenAI made these tools available to everyone, it sparked curiosity across industries, demystifying opportunities that once seemed like science fiction. Healthcare, with its complex needs, quickly saw the potential. People began asking more sophisticated questions, exploring the possibilities of AI, and envisioning how it could revolutionize patient care and operational efficiency.
AI's rapid evolution has extended beyond healthcare, embedding itself into everyday conversations, customer service interactions, and even creative fields. This widespread adoption has shifted societal views—AI is no longer a distant, futuristic concept but a present and essential tool that enhances daily life. As AI continues to evolve, its impact on healthcare is expected to deepen. AI-driven tools are increasingly seen not just as operational aids but as integral components that can transform healthcare delivery, making it more accessible, efficient, and accurate.
Infinite Composability
Efficiency and accuracy in complex tasks performed by AI are part of the giant leap forward we've recently experienced. Jan calls this leap "infinite composability." In the past, AI struggled to build upon previous outputs. If you tried to string tasks together, the results often deteriorated as you progressed. Now, however, AI can combine multiple, related tasks effectively, enabling the development of more sophisticated and comprehensive solutions. This is a game-changer for healthcare, where processes are inherently complex and multifaceted. With infinite composability, AI can now assist with tasks that were once too intricate for automation, improving everything from patient data management to clinical decision support. Synthpop's AI solutions, for example, reduce the time-consuming, mundane tasks that contribute to healthcare professional burnout—and this is just the beginning.
Jan shares, "Every week, we learn of new model capabilities, lower latencies, larger prompt windows, and lower costs, which expand the number of applications that AI can revolutionize. The composability of these functions, including multimodal inputs and outputs, is creating limitless opportunities for novel application development."
Scalability
Knowing there are limitless opportunities, how do we harness AI to serve growing organizations and support large patient populations? Jan highlights the importance of scalability, especially in healthcare. He uses a compelling analogy: "You can hire a handyman to fix a single plumbing issue, or you can hire an architect to design a system that serves thousands of homes—this is where AI in healthcare is heading." Initially, AI solutions were developed to solve specific, isolated problems. But as AI technologies have matured, engineers can now design systems that scale across large databases and user groups, supporting entire healthcare networks rather than individual tasks.
This scalability is crucial in healthcare, where managing large volumes of patient data and ensuring compliance with regulatory standards are everyday challenges. Scalable AI allows what once required an army of administrative staff to be handled by a few AI agents, enabling healthcare providers to focus more on patient care and less on paperwork.
Jan’s team continues to work closely with Synthpop’s business team, who have deep roots in healthcare and the insight to identify the most pressing customer needs. This foundation, combined with our entrepreneurial skill, allows us to iterate quickly on our products and assemble a team with the most up-to-date understanding of the rapid advances in generative AI. We know this combination is difficult to replicate and gives us a comfortable advantage over any competitors.
Security, Privacy and Trust
The swift integration and evolution of AI hasn't gone unnoticed by policymakers. Across the country, the rise of AI has triggered proposals for legislative measures aimed at regulating its use, ensuring that these powerful tools are deployed responsibly and ethically. These proposed regulations highlight the need for a balance between innovation and oversight—a balance that we know is especially crucial in healthcare, where patient safety and privacy are paramount.
The Synthpop team has prioritized data security and patient privacy above all else, using innovative techniques to ensure HIPAA compliance and adhering to strict regulatory standards, including SOC2 certification and monitoring by Drata. As AI systems become more integrated into healthcare, developing and maintaining these security guidelines will be critical to ensuring that trust is never compromised.
The Domino Effect for Revenue
Lastly, one of the most obvious reasons for the buzz around AI is its potential for significant financial savings and revenue growth. Better, faster systems build trust and improve relationships with ordering providers, which in turn can lead to more business. Additionally, AI solutions like those offered by Synthpop help ensure that documentation is more accurate and claims are submitted more quickly, while also reducing the likelihood of denials. This domino effect—improved efficiency leading to increased trust, leading to more business—ultimately drives revenue growth.
Synthpop’s intake product plays a crucial role in this process by automating tedious and repetitive tasks that often extend the time from “Order to Cash.” We streamline the intake process by automatically sorting and categorizing incoming documents, and extracting discrete data. The accuracy of the data extraction and entry can cut out time typically spent on correcting errors and resubmitting claims.
Another way this effectively lowers operational costs is by empowering organizations to handle a higher volume of patient care requests without needing to hire additional staff.
So, why is everyone talking about AI in healthcare now? Because the technology has reached a tipping point. Increased awareness, combined with breakthroughs in AI capabilities and scalability, has made AI an indispensable tool in modern healthcare. As companies like Synthpop continue to push the boundaries, integrating AI into more aspects of healthcare, the industry is poised for even greater transformations in the years to come.
The future is here, and it’s being shaped by AI.
Contact Synthpop to learn how AI can support your team and streamline your workflows.
