Cerner adds AI workflow tool to combat physician burnout
Health technology company Cerner is now offering an AI workflow tool that aims to temper physician burnout, the company announced during the HIMSS conference in Orlando.
Cerner’s Chart Assist tool—which was showcased during the conference—is an AI-enabled workflow that can identify gaps and inconsistencies within a patient record. By helping manage patient care and validating diagnoses, the company hopes the tool can help reduce physician workload, increase productivity and reduce burnout.
In a recent report, Cerner was among several healthcare companies pushing to add AI capabilities—like natural language processing, machine learning and clinical decision support— to electronic health records (EHRs).
“The healthcare environment is demanding, fast-paced and can take an emotional toll on clinicians. Cerner has set out to make the physician experience easier with our AI technology,” Jeffrey Wall, MD, Cerner’s director and physician strategy executive, said in a prepared statement. “Some physicians express feelings of fatigue, frustration and disempowerment.”
In a statement to AI in Healthcare, Wall said workflow tools like Chart Assist use AI to bring together and parse data gathered through EHRs over several years and guide, suggest and validate diagnoses and treatment decisions.
“We are using AI to go behind the scenes and automate some of the processes so that physicians can more wholly focus on patient care rather than clerical responsibilities of documentation,” Wall told AI in Healthcare. “Our goal is to help physicians address patient care while reducing their workload and improving the patient-physician interaction. Our investments in AI evolve the EHR and deliver a more intuitive design to reduce physician burnout.”
Danielle covers Clinical Innovation & Technology as a senior news writer for TriMed Media. Previously, she worked as a news reporter in northeast Missouri and earned a journalism degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She's also a huge fan of the Chicago Cubs, Bears and Bulls.