Trace Id is missing
12/3/2024

Acentra Health boosts employee productivity with generative AI and Azure OpenAI Service, saving 11,000 nursing hours and nearly $800,000

Acentra Health, a US company offering healthcare solutions and services, is embracing generative AI technology and substantially saving time for its specially trained nurses.

Within six months, the company developed and deployed MedScribe, a web application that uses Azure OpenAI Service to generate draft letters that respond to appeals for healthcare services.

Acentra Health reduced the time spent on each appeal determination letter by about 50%, saved 11,000 nursing hours and nearly $800,000, helped each nurse process 20–30 letters daily, and achieved a 99% approval rate for MedScribe-generated letters.

Acentra Health

We continually consider how we can use AI to better serve our clients and their priority populations while maintaining the highest possible privacy, security, and compliance standards. The key advantage to our Microsoft relationship is that we are able to introduce the latest AI capabilities in a secure, HIPAA-compliant enclave.

Sean Harrison, Chief Analytics Officer, Acentra Health

Generative AI–powered tools are creating new opportunities for the healthcare industry to maximize workforce talents and introduce new efficiencies to cut costs. As a provider of technology and health solutions and services for government healthcare agencies, Acentra Health is pioneering generative AI solutions in a secure, governed environment. Within six months, the company designed, tested, and deployed a web application, called MedScribe, that uses generative AI to draft personalized letters for Medicare quick appeal decisions.

With MedScribe, Acentra Health reduced the time that its specially trained nursing staff spent on each appeal determination letter by approximately 50%. By mid-2024, the company had saved 11,000 nursing hours and begun preparations to expand MedScribe to other areas to drive organizational efficiency.

Simplifying operations to meet 24-hour deadlines

Acentra Health supports 45 Medicaid agencies and 25 federal agencies in the United States. As part of its commitment to accelerating better outcomes for the public health sector, the company continually strives to modernize the healthcare experience and empower its workforce to deliver compassionate, timely services to beneficiaries and care providers. The company’s appeals process, where a Medicare physician must approve or deny an appeal in as little as 24 hours, was one area that Acentra Health identified as an opportunity for AI innovation.

To complete the appeals process, specially trained nurses at Acentra Health would receive a physician’s notes on the appeal and then write letters to send to the beneficiary and the hospital or care provider. The notes often include clinical terms and medical acronyms to explain the appeal decision. “Our nurses’ job was to receive the physician’s rationale and translate it into layman’s terms and an appropriate reading level,” says Rosemarie Hartnett, Director of Operations, Beneficiary and Family Centered Care, at Acentra Health. “It had to be in plain and empathetic language, and our nurses were doing that on their own.”

Acentra Health saw an opportunity to harness generative AI to simplify this writing process. The company had worked with Microsoft before on AI initiatives and began to conceptualize a new web application that could use the Microsoft Azure ecosystem.

Technology is rapidly evolving, so there’s always something new, but technology is not any good if it’s just for technology’s sake. It’s effective when we find those opportunities to apply it in a way that’s meaningful to our team.

Michael Worthington, Vice President of AI and Analytics, Acentra Health

Deploying a custom writing solution in six months

In mid-2023, Acentra Health began developing its generative AI­­­–powered tool, MedScribe. This web application connects to Azure OpenAI Service and generates an initial response letter for each appeal according to the physician’s notes. Acentra Health tested MedScribe with a group of 10 nurses, incorporating a thumbs-up/thumbs-down approval for nurses to evaluate each draft letter. The company then refined the application before rolling it out to all its nurses who write appeal response letters.

“One of the keys to our success was having a really good working relationship with our clinical teams,” says Sean Harrison, Chief Analytics Officer at Acentra Health. “It was a partnership with them in building MedScribe and getting their feedback to make sure that the prompts we used would craft the appropriate language for a response.”

Within six months, Acentra Health moved from a concept to full deployment, confident in its capabilities and compliance with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) regulations. Acentra Health has high standards for security and data protection. “We continually consider how we can use AI to better serve our clients and their priority populations while maintaining the highest possible privacy, security, and compliance standards,” says Harrison. “The key advantage to our Microsoft relationship is that we are able to introduce the latest AI capabilities in a secure, HIPAA-compliant enclave.”

After deploying its solution, the company began tracking metrics such as approval ratings, volume, and time spent per letter. Acentra Health was able to easily visualize the data from these metrics using dashboards in Microsoft Power BI, which helped the team track MedScribe’s activity and performance and highlight trends in nurse feedback about the quality of letter generation.

Saving 11,000 nursing hours with a 99% approval rate

MedScribe helps Acentra Health’s productivity in responding to appeals. The application has reduced the time that a nurse spends on each letter by approximately 50%, from an average of six minutes to an average of three minutes per letter. This adds up to 11,000 nursing hours and nearly $800,000 that have been saved since deploying MedScribe. Now, each nurse reviews from 20 through 30 appeal response letters per day, compared with from 12 through 14 before MedScribe, and the company processes up to 1,000 letters daily.

The MedScribe-generated response letters are tailored to the recipients: The tool automatically adjusts the reading level and tone for beneficiaries or care providers. These letters have a 99% approval rating from the nurses who review them. “I think the favorite thing is the speed with which MedScribe works for them,” says Hartnett. “They get immediate output, each letter is individualized, and the nurses are able to just review the letter rather than having to type it all out.”

In the first six months, Acentra Health completed 65,000 letters. Its nurses love the new tool, which boosts employee satisfaction and productivity. “The nurses constantly tell us that of all the improvements we’ve attempted over the years, MedScribe has probably been the most impactful,” says Hartnett.

Expanding innovation for today’s healthcare recipient

Using generative AI to write appeal determination letters more quickly and improve the process is only the beginning. Acentra Health is already testing MedScribe in its quality-of-care division, crafting longer and more complex letters for beneficiaries according to physician review.

Investing in new, AI–powered technologies is one way to unlock the full potential of Acentra Health’s employees to serve clients. “Technology is rapidly evolving, so there’s always something new, but technology is not any good if it’s just for technology’s sake,” says Michael Worthington, Vice President of AI and Analytics at Acentra Health. “It’s effective when we find those opportunities to apply it in a way that’s meaningful to our team.”

The nurses constantly tell us that of all the improvements we’ve attempted over the years, MedScribe has probably been the most impactful.

Rosemarie Hartnett, Director of Operations, Beneficiary and Family Centered Care, Acentra Health

Discover more about Acentra Health on LinkedIn and X/Twitter.

Medical Device Disclaimer. Microsoft product(s)/service(s) (1) are not designed, intended or made available as a medical device(s), and (2) are not designed or intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, or judgment and should not be used to replace or as a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, treatment, or judgment.

Discover more details

Take the next step

Fuel innovation with Microsoft

Talk to an expert about custom solutions

Let us help you create customized solutions and achieve your unique business goals.

Drive results with proven solutions

Achieve more with the products and solutions that helped our customers reach their goals.

Follow Microsoft