UPMC, Sharp case study shows how hospitals are already pushing AI to the limit

Early adopting providers such as Sharp Healthcare and UPMC have been keen on seeing how far they can push the complex but extraordinarily helpful technology today, knowing that AI will play a much bigger role in their organizations tomorrow. "Currently, very little artificial intelligence is being utilized across the healthcare sector overall," said Brett MacLaren, vice president of enterprise analytics at Sharp HealthCare. "At Sharp, we are using predictive algorithms to predict a patient's propensity to pay their bill, and are leveraging that insight to prioritize who to contact and negotiate with to increase their likelihood of payment." In addition, Sharp HealthCare recently completed a proof of concept to develop an algorithm to predict patient decline in the acute care setting by analyzing its electronic health record data to see when rapid response teams are called in to intervene on its sickest patients. "At this point, we have not quantified the additional value the predictive algorithm on a patient's propensity to pay has bill provided to our bottom line, but the consensus is that it has been worthwhile," MacLaren said.