MIT Technology Review is reporting that the global healthcare sector is increasingly turning to agentic artificial intelligence to alleviate severe strain caused by chronic underinvestment and a surge in demand from aging populations. The World Health Organization has warned that current shortfalls in healthcare workers are projected to reach 11 million by 2030.
KPMG found that more than two-thirds, or 68%, of healthcare providers have already adopted AI agents into their workforce. These technologies are being deployed to automate complex back-office processes, collaborate with medical teams and triage patients, aiming to reduce the cognitive load on clinicians and enhance patient care as human worker supply dwindles.
Ashis Barad, MD, chief digital and technology officer at Hospital for Special Surgery (HSS) in New York, said agentic AI differs from previous digitalization efforts like electronic health records and telehealth. He said AI agents can handle nuanced, complex scenarios, make autonomous decisions, retrieve information from expert sources and iterate over time, freeing clinicians for higher-level patient care.
At HSS, AI agents are handling complex backend processes such as insurance claims, completing 1,100 claims per month. Dr. Barad said they have reduced the appeals stage from 45 minutes to five and improved the success rate of those appeals from 65% to 100% in nine months. HSS now manages all claims in-house.
Building on this success, HSS is deploying AI agents in non-clinical patient-facing settings through a collaboration with Ema Unlimited. This 24/7 AI scheduling and triage service uses conversational AI to ask clarifying questions, then books appointments with the most appropriate clinician, considering location, insurance and availability. Dr. Barad said the system is trained on HSS's context, rules and knowledge base, providing streamlined access to specialist knowledge.
Safeguards are built into the triage service, with sensitive or complex scenarios escalated to human specialists. Every AI agent decision is auditable, and human staff can intervene at any point. Patient data is kept secure, and the system adheres to HSS protocols. Dr. Barad emphasized the importance of such guardrails, noting that an AI subcommittee co-chaired by him scrutinizes AI agents touching patient care with greater rigor.
Deloitte research found that leading agentic AI adopters in healthcare are more likely to redesign end-to-end workflows rather than focusing on narrow solutions. Dr. Barad said agentic AI should be viewed as a general-purpose technology, analogous to electricity, requiring a unified data strategy to integrate fragmented data sources across an organization. He envisions a future where 90% of non-clinical healthcare tasks could be administered by AI agents, allowing clinicians to focus on complex, specialized cases. KPMG research indicates 84% of providers are comfortable delegating decision-making for specific processes to AI agents. Dr. Barad said this shift will "rehumanize health care."
Full Article: Rehumanizing global health care with agentic AI