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Multilingual AI Scribe Provides Documentation Relief to Providers

January 16, 2025

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Assessing the problem of provider burnout

The start of a new year is a great time for medical practices to take a closer look at some of the challenges that are common to organizations of every size and specialty. Topping that list is the persistent issue of provider burnout.

The statistical record has been clear: For most of the last 20 years, rates of physician burnout have been climbing, with some surveys showing half or more of all practitioners reporting one or more symptoms of burnout.

The causes are equally well-known, ranging from rising documentation and reporting requirements to increasing complex Electronic Health Record systems and staff shortages.

Dr. Christine Sinsky, vice president of professional satisfaction for the American Medical Association, said in an interview last August that physicians are feeling stressed not because of the work they do with patients — they love the art of caring for others — but because there are simply too many administrative tasks to handle.

“The stress, I believe, comes from spending our time doing the wrong work,” Sinsky said. “From things that get in the way of taking the very best care we can of patients. So one of the top reasons that physicians report stress is that there’s not enough support staff. So physicians end up, then, doing work that other team members could do if there were more support staff, and that means we can’t offer the same level of care to our patients or the same care to as many patients as we would if there was adequate staffing.”

Microphone listening to conversationHow an AI medical scribe can help

But there is good news. Since 2021, according to AMA survey data, burnout rates have actually fallen — from 56% in 2001 to 52% in 2022, and 48% in 2023. The trend for 2024 — the full statistical picture is not yet available — suggests the rate will be even lower, at about 45%.

At least part of the reason for those declines is the growing use of medical scribes powered by artificial intelligence. Such scribes, which are increasingly accurate and cost effective, directly address the burden of documentation by allowing providers to focus on patients, not computers, during their visits.

By capturing clinical details and creating draft Progress Notes for the provider, these scribes give medical professionals a huge edge, saving hours of time each week and allowing them both to finish their documentation at the office and focus more of their energy on developing effective treatment plans for patients.

People talking iconWhat is a multilingual AI scribe? How does it work?

It is also instructive that the best AI medical scribes on the market today are multilingual scribes, capable of documenting patient-provider visits in both English and other languages widely spoken by a practice’s patients.

Providers at Healing Hands Ministries (HHM) Health in Dallas, Texas, for example, have been using Sunoh.ai medical scribe to reduce documentation time and help bilingual providers, many of whose patients are native Spanish speakers.

Handling encounters plus hundreds of lab orders daily

“Sunoh.ai has truly been a game-changer,” said Dr. Scarlet Y. Herrarte Fornos, an infectious disease specialist at HHM, who uses Sunoh with hundreds of patients each month. “I run numerous labs and typically receive around 250-400 labs daily. With Sunoh.ai, I can review my lab inbox much faster, which facilitates better clinical decision-making. Sunoh.ai has also improved my patient interactions, which is especially important with young patients.”

Sunoh uses ambient listening technology and natural language processing to document care in English, Portuguese, and 20 dialects of Spanish. That represents a huge advantage for medical practices such as HHM Health that serve areas with large concentrations of patients for whom English is not their native language.

And Sunoh does much more than summarize the visit. It effectively captures the details of lab, imaging, procedure, medication orders, and follow-up visits. It streamlines clinical documentation by categorizing the summarized content into various sections of a Progress Note. That allows the provider to more efficiently review the note, making any modifications or edits that may be required before finalizing it as part of the patient’s record.

Breaking language barriers in the Sun Belt

Like Texas, Arizona has many native Spanish speakers — approximately 1.29 million of the state’s 7.15 million residents — and continues to experience strong growth. Sun Life Health, with 14 locations in Pinal and Maricopa counties, delivers comprehensive services to more than 48,000 patients annually. Their services include primary care, dental care, orthodontics, pediatrics, OB/GYN, telehealth, and walk-in care.

The use of a multilingual AI scribe has been extremely effective for Sun Life’s large Spanish-speaking community, with some 300 visits a month being conducted in Spanish.

“One of our providers can add four more patients to the schedule with time savings and reduced burnout,” said Trey Davis, director of information systems at Sun Life Health. “Sunoh.ai has been a game changer in assisting providers complete notes on time and improving work-life balance.”

Benefits of implementing an AI scribe

A March 2024 study in New England Journal of Medicine Catalyst, “Ambient Artificial Intelligence Scribes to Alleviate the Burden of Clinical Documentation,” looked at the widespread use of AI medical scribes among physicians at The Permanente Medical Group. Based on more than 303,000 patient encounters using an AI medical scribe, the paper concluded that physicians generally favor the use of such scribes and patients give positive feedback.

Among the findings:

  • 81% of patients at one site reported their physician spent less time looking at a computer screen during an encounter that made use of an AI medical scribe versus an earlier encounter without such a tool.
  • Anecdotal evidence suggested that clinicians found an AI scribe to be “particularly useful for very long appointments (>60 minutes) including one in which a 50-page transcript could easily be condensed and edited by the clinician to document their interaction.”

Why is Sunoh.ai the go-to multilingual AI medical scribe?

Icons of a computer, a doctor, and a microphone connected to the Sunoh.ai AI medical scribe logo

One limitation of the NEJM Catalyst study was the AI medical scribe used, which was limited to recording encounters conducted in English. Sunoh.ai, is a multilingual medical scribe extending access to care for increasingly diverse communities.

Key features offered by the Sunoh.ai multilingual medical scribe

Diverse language support: Millions of Americans speak a language other than English at home, and some communities have significant numbers of speakers in dozens of foreign languages. Sunoh’s ability to document in English, Portuguese, and Spanish — with more languages under development — is key to accurately capturing clinical details of patient encounters. And Sunoh handles dialects and accents.

Adaptable for multiple specialties: Sunoh.ai is useful for all types of providers. It creates draft Progress Notes for general practitioners, DAP Notes for providers of behavioral health services, helps dental providers with periocharting and dental plans, is employed by orthopedic practitioners, dermatologists, rheumatologists, and vision specialists, among many others.

Increased “stethoscope time”: Sunoh.ai takes aim at the most fundamental challenge faced by all medical providers — ensuring they have enough time to truly understand each patient’s needs. More “stethoscope time” can mean deeper understanding, picking up on body language and subtle verbal clues — all of which can help promote better case management and outcomes.

Accurate records of each visit: Sunoh.ai discerns the difference between clinically relevant portions of a patient visit and social chat, creating a succinct and useful draft note. Providers needn’t worry about recalling clinical details or trying to sift through the patient’s record to find what matters most. Their review remains essential, but Sunoh.ai gives them a head start.

Savings hours of time daily: Because Sunoh.ai creates a summary and transcript for each patient visit, it helps providers better focus on their patients during the visit and saves them hours of work afterwards. Providers can see additional patients, get other work done, or improve work-life balance by reducing or eliminating hours spent working at home.

To learn more about Sunoh’s AI medical scribe and how it can help your practice, visit Sunoh.ai to book a demo or sign up.

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