The post-acute tech company WellSky is partnering with Google Cloud to enhance its artificial intelligence, data analytics and machine learning capabilities.
Google Cloud is a segment of Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG), the parent company of the tech giant Google. The collaboration will bring WellSky larger access to Google Cloud’s Vertex AI, an AI platform that contains more than 130 generative models, among other features.
“Our goal is to streamline the clinician workflow so instead of focusing on taking notes or wading through pages and pages of documentation, our providers can focus on meaningful time with their patients,” Tim Ashe, chief clinical officer for WellSky, told Hospice News. “What’s great about AI is the summarization capabilities. AI can read through notes and extract the most important information as well as categorize it. That can mean faster discharges to post-acute care.”
The platform can also aid in functions like coding and revenue cycle management, according to Ashe.
Nationally, hospice providers are leveraging technology to build greater efficiency into their workflows and, in turn, aid with recruitment and retention. Providers have increasingly sought methods for streamlining clinical teams’ administrative tasks, for instance, including time spent on documentation.
This lean toward efficiency reflects larger trends in the industry as the labor pool dwindles. Without more boots to put on the ground, providers are seeking ways to get more productivity from the ones they already have in place.
Embedding Google Cloud’s AI tools into WellSky’s solutions can improve automation of repetitive tasks and provide fast access to patient data and trends. The company also indicated that it would automate portions of the Outcome and Assessment Information Set (OASIS) process for home health providers.
This collaboration is the most recent development in a longstanding relationship between Google and WellSky.
“Google has been WellSky’s primary technology partner for some time now as we work to modernize our IT infrastructure. As we began to explore new possibilities for AI innovation across our solutions offerings, it became clear that Google could also help us in this emerging area,” Ashe said. “We knew they had a very similar vision in regards to responsible and secure implementation of AI, and we knew Google could provide the building blocks that we could run with for creating new capabilities within our solutions.”
Companies featured in this article:
