AI Should Give Clinicians Back to Patients
Everybody in healthcare wants to talk about AI.
Will it replace clinicians?
Will it write our notes?
Will it make care more efficient?
Larry Benz thinks those questions are too small.
In this episode of THE OPERATOR, Larry joins Jimmy McKay to ask a better question: What should AI give back?
For Larry, the answer is not simply time savings, more throughput, or better productivity numbers. The real promise of AI in healthcare is the chance to give clinicians back their attention, presence, judgment, and connection with patients.
Larry argues that if AI scribes are used merely to help clinicians see more patients per day, healthcare leaders will have automated the same system that burned people out in the first place.
<<< Subscribe to The Operator on Substack.
This conversation explores burnout, documentation burden, clinical judgment, AI scribes, the danger of productivity-first implementation, and why healthcare needs an operator-level redesign around humanity.
In this episode- Why Larry starts the AI conversation with a clinician’s oath
- What it means to “give the human being back to the patient”
- Why burnout is a system problem, not just a resilience problem
- How AI scribes can either restore care or accelerate burnout
- Why “automation” is the wrong mental model for healthcare
- The cockpit analogy for AI-supported clinical care
- Why “AI drafts, clinicians decide” should be a design principle
- What healthcare CEOs should measure when investing in AI
- The worst thing leaders can do with the time AI gives back
- How this connects to Larry’s Called to Care in the Age of AI series
If AI only makes clinicians faster, we may have missed the point. If it gives them back presence, attention, and humanity, then technology might actually help us care more.
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All right,
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everybody wants to talk about AI,
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or maybe they don't wanna talk about it,
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but they sure are talking about it.
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And the questions come up.
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Will it replace clinicians?
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Will it write our notes?
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Yes.
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Will it make healthcare more efficient?
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Hmm, remains to be seen.
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Larry's latest article asks a completely
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different question.
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What if AI isn't here to replace
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clinicians?
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What if it's here to give them back
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the part of the job they fell in
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love with,
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in the first place.
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So Larry, let's start there.
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Why do you think everybody's asking the
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wrong question?
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Because you open and you say,
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forty years ago,
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I took an oath to care for people.
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You started with an oath forty years ago,
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not with AI.
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Why did you start with that oath from
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long ago?
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Yeah,
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I think it's because the conversation
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about AI has already gone backwards and I
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wanted to reset
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and level set around why we got into
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this profession.
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Everyone is now entering it asking what
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the technology can do.
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I wanted to start with what I promised
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to do as a caregiver, four years ago,
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to a patient as a caregiver,
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not to a vendor.
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And so the oath sort of frames the
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tool, not the other way around.
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If you start with AI,
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you're already conceded the argument to
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the people selling it.
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I'm just not interested in that
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conversation for the purposes of call to
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care.
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I'm interested in what we owe the person
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on the table, the patient.
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So the oath is the standard,
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the code of ethics,
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the whole professional reasons why we got
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in here.
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AI either measures up to it or doesn't.
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Alright,
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so one of the strongest lines in the
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article, I thought anyway,
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was the only question worth asking is
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whether we have the discipline to use this
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tool for the one thing it's actually good
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for good for giving the human being back
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to the patient.
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What do you mean by giving the human
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being back?
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What does that mean to you?
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Yeah, so if you think historically,
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as your time as a PT and healthcare
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provider,
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what we've really been robbed is with time
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with patients,
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particularly in physical therapy where
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everything has been, you know,
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remediated or, you know,
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gone down to a billable unit.
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It's all about documentation,
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pre-authorization, productivity mandates,
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the nine-minute, eight-minute rule,
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not twelve-minute visit windows.
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Every one of those looks like another
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minute of attention redirected at a
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screen.
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So giving the human being back means
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reversing that theft.
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Eyes on the patient,
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listening for the thing that the chart can
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never capture,
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noticing what the patient isn't saying,
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the verbal and the nonverbal.
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That encounter fully present
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undistracted is what got engineered out of
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workflow and maximizing productivity and
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efficiency we need to engineer it back in
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and that's the whole argument everything
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else is footnotes i started writing an
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article and tim flynn was helping me with
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it and i think i actually sent it
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to you to review a bit and it's
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about the five agents everything in ai now
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is about agentic
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movement and moving to agents.
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I love that.
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And I've identified what I believe are
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five agents that can help us in physical
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therapy.
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because at the end of the day they
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bring humanness back to health care and
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the one we're going to talk about in
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this article or what we did talk about
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in this article and it'll transgress a
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little bit also while i'm reintroducing
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call to care is about the whole idea
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of bringing the human back and using ai
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scribe for the documentation pieces but
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don't get me wrong scribes and agents can
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do many other things they can do pre-cert
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They can do outcomes.
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They can give us feedback loops and a
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daily report of how we conducted.
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They can listen to our notes and give
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us constructive criticism on how we better
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have verbal and nonverbal skills.
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So I'm all for AI,
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but I believe its function is really
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around humanity and allowing us to be
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fully human and present for our patients
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as opposed to be fully engaged in a
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technology.
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So let's bring some humanity into it.
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You brought someone into this particular
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article.
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You named her Sarah.
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You said, you know, painted a picture.
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She's not a bad clinician.
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She's been around for about twelve years.
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She's not burned out because she stopped
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caring.
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She's burned out because the system slowly
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pulled her away
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from the work she loved.
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And I think a lot of people will
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say, well, these kids today,
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it's very easy to fall into it.
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These kids today don't.
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But when you look at it that way,
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because she's burned out because the
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system pulled her away from the thing she
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loved.
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How common do you think a Sarah is?
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um well i've known a hundred of them
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i've employed probably hundreds of them in
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the last forty years when your burnout
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rate runs from forty five to seventy one
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percent just on pts and i cite in
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the article dentists and dental hygienists
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and others um and when you have a
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one year arguably fifteen thousand pts
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walking out the door she's not the outlier
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You know, she's she's the norm.
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And and we have to recall the data,
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which shows that on a full time equivalent
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basis,
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only twenty five percent of all physical
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therapists that are licensed are actually
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practicing clinically.
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But what makes Sarah's story so worth
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telling is that she's a great clinician.
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Her outcomes are strong,
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her patients like her,
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her colleagues respect her,
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and she's counting the years until she can
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afford to leave.
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And that's the tell.
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It's not the weak clinician burning out,
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it's the good ones,
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the ones who came in with passion and
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skill that the system,
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the ones who worked hard in school to
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even get accepted in PT school.
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Now, they didn't lose their ability,
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they left their sense of calling.
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They lost their meaningful purposeful work
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And once that goes, the clock is running.
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It's just a function until they're looking
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to get into a non-clinical position.
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I feel like one of the distinctions that
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you made is two sides to a coin.
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People go back and forth and they argue
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over it.
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That burnout isn't this personal failure.
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It's a system that stopped replenishing
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its people,
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what I just said a minute ago.
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Why is that distinction so important to
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focus on where that fault actually is or
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where the solution could be?
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Yeah, it's like everything, anything else.
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You know, once you have the diagnosis,
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then you could determine the prescription.
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Right.
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And I would also argue the system includes
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our education system because we know
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statistically that by the time new PTs
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land in our clinic for their first full
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time job,
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a good portion of them are already burned
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out.
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Now, we can argue about the term burnout.
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There's some medical things around it.
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I've written pretty extensively about it.
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But let's forget about the word for a
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minute.
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Just think of it as people leaving the
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profession or being disengaged.
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When you're disengaged and working with
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patients,
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you're less likely to have very good
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outcomes.
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um if it's a personal failure then the
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fix would be resilience you know wellness
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you know a lot of those kinds of
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things but we've been running that
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experiment now for a long time you know
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burnout has actually gotten worse even
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though there's been a more sensitivity to
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it it's actually gotten worse so the inner
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intervention is is failed because it's
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treated it's treated the wrong problem
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when you name it as a system failure
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you're forced to redesign the system
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that's much harder
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And no one in leadership really wants to
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talk about because it lands accountability
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where it belongs, the operators.
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And again, it's all back to operation,
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the people who built the workflows that
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the very clinicians were trying to keep.
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So that's the distinction.
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It's not a semantic description, Jimmy.
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It's really what determines whether
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anything actually can change or happen to
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improve this.
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Let's talk about AI scribes.
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I feel like everybody markets them when
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you see an ad for them.
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If you get on a call with someone
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who's wanted to talk about them,
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they lead with efficiency.
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That's their sell.
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It's an efficiency tool.
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And then they'll hit you with a statistic,
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usually in time or money saved.
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You argue that's almost missing the point.
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Where are they missing the point on this?
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Yeah,
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so let's just level set here a bit.
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It took us a long time to get
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adoption to EMR,
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especially in physical therapy.
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The good news, I think,
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is that there's been reasonable adoption
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and quick adoption by AI scribes in PT
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and in healthcare in general.
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I've put dentistry a little bit behind in
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that regards.
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But why has that been the push?
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The push is because we want to make
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the system more efficient.
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and efficiency is the wrong goal.
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If you deploy a scribe and tell a
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therapist that the point is that you can
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now see more patients per day,
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you've simply designed a tool, you know,
00:09:25.554 --> 00:09:27.495
you've designed a tool to restore humanity
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to work and used it to accelerate the
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very thing and the very reason why Sarah
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is burning out.
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You haven't solved the problem,
00:09:34.659 --> 00:09:36.461
you've automated it while leaving
00:09:36.500 --> 00:09:37.721
everything else intact.
00:09:37.802 --> 00:09:39.682
And that's sort of the, in the article,
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I talk about Dr.
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Blaine's calcification with a software
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upgrade.
00:09:45.140 --> 00:09:46.062
And the other thing is,
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if the win is, oh,
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we're doing this for our therapists,
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this is how much we care,
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and this is why we want to attract
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more PTs because we have such shortages,
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because you'll be able to,
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by using a scribe,
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you'll have less time on notes
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you know, in the office,
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so more time at home.
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And, you know, that's real,
00:10:04.076 --> 00:10:05.839
and that's a quality of life improvement,
00:10:05.859 --> 00:10:07.840
but that's just optimizing Sarah's
00:10:07.941 --> 00:10:08.360
evenings.
00:10:08.461 --> 00:10:10.783
I'm not interested in what happens to the
00:10:10.822 --> 00:10:12.544
patient, you know,
00:10:12.965 --> 00:10:14.166
what happened to the patient in the room.
00:10:14.206 --> 00:10:17.168
The scribe's purpose is simply to make
00:10:17.688 --> 00:10:19.671
Sarah faster by that, you know,
00:10:19.770 --> 00:10:21.673
unprofessional management business speak.
00:10:22.693 --> 00:10:23.674
That's not the purpose.
00:10:23.715 --> 00:10:25.937
The purpose is to make her fully present
00:10:25.996 --> 00:10:26.616
for the patient.
00:10:27.421 --> 00:10:29.701
Those are very different goals with very
00:10:29.782 --> 00:10:31.101
different outcomes.
00:10:31.442 --> 00:10:32.682
If it's efficiency,
00:10:32.942 --> 00:10:34.643
it's going to lack effectiveness.
00:10:35.043 --> 00:10:36.263
If it's effectiveness,
00:10:36.503 --> 00:10:38.423
it's going to be got effectiveness.
00:10:39.004 --> 00:10:41.803
Management keeps confusing them and the
00:10:41.865 --> 00:10:42.965
patients pay for it.
00:10:43.304 --> 00:10:45.684
So if you look at most large scale
00:10:46.306 --> 00:10:47.865
operating platforms,
00:10:48.381 --> 00:10:49.062
in healthcare.
00:10:49.101 --> 00:10:52.543
They're getting AI scribes to claim they
00:10:52.582 --> 00:10:54.303
have a better workplace for the therapist
00:10:54.344 --> 00:10:55.724
so they have less notes at home,
00:10:56.424 --> 00:10:58.445
claim the therapist can see more patients,
00:10:58.485 --> 00:11:00.145
but none of them are talking about the
00:11:00.186 --> 00:11:01.706
very thing that it's meant to do,
00:11:02.145 --> 00:11:04.206
bring humanity back to healthcare and
00:11:04.246 --> 00:11:06.067
allow them to be fully present and be
00:11:06.148 --> 00:11:08.467
more effective to produce better outcomes.
00:11:08.888 --> 00:11:10.168
That's the real difference.
00:11:10.729 --> 00:11:11.568
You know,
00:11:11.589 --> 00:11:12.649
the first time I took a look at
00:11:12.669 --> 00:11:14.029
an AI scribe a year and a half,
00:11:14.070 --> 00:11:15.931
two years ago, I, of course,
00:11:16.390 --> 00:11:18.451
default to like an advertising campaign.
00:11:18.490 --> 00:11:18.951
And I said,
00:11:19.351 --> 00:11:21.652
this might bring eye contact back.
00:11:21.751 --> 00:11:22.913
And as simple as that is,
00:11:23.212 --> 00:11:25.693
that felt more humane than the twenty
00:11:25.734 --> 00:11:28.413
eight minutes per note saved.
00:11:28.553 --> 00:11:29.394
That felt better.
00:11:30.735 --> 00:11:34.456
You talk about a cockpit analogy instead
00:11:34.596 --> 00:11:35.777
of automation,
00:11:36.297 --> 00:11:36.677
where
00:11:39.417 --> 00:11:41.580
The autopilot does the mundane.
00:11:41.820 --> 00:11:43.602
It maps, it flies,
00:11:43.682 --> 00:11:44.604
it goes up and down,
00:11:44.703 --> 00:11:46.667
but the human comes in at different
00:11:46.706 --> 00:11:47.086
points.
00:11:47.488 --> 00:11:50.792
Why is automation the wrong mental model
00:11:50.812 --> 00:11:51.352
for healthcare?
00:11:51.393 --> 00:11:52.653
Because behind AI,
00:11:52.754 --> 00:11:54.317
automation has got to be the next most
00:11:54.397 --> 00:11:55.258
used word recently.
00:11:55.477 --> 00:11:57.620
yeah it is it's the wrong word again
00:11:57.639 --> 00:11:59.761
because it implies automation implies
00:11:59.802 --> 00:12:02.524
replacement you know on a factory line a
00:12:02.543 --> 00:12:05.667
machine removes the human in a clinic that
00:12:05.726 --> 00:12:09.529
collapses on contact with reality right a
00:12:09.570 --> 00:12:10.029
therapist
00:12:10.986 --> 00:12:12.928
can't hand clinical judgment to a
00:12:13.009 --> 00:12:14.389
probabilistic system.
00:12:14.750 --> 00:12:16.351
It can't automate that out of it.
00:12:16.772 --> 00:12:19.354
No patient ever got better because a model
00:12:19.835 --> 00:12:22.417
was confident, right?
00:12:22.437 --> 00:12:25.078
So the cockpit is the right mental model
00:12:25.099 --> 00:12:28.001
because the roles stay very, very clear.
00:12:28.842 --> 00:12:32.024
The autopilot flies the plane, altitude,
00:12:32.086 --> 00:12:33.326
course, systems.
00:12:34.027 --> 00:12:35.467
The pilot commands it.
00:12:36.188 --> 00:12:39.413
It takes over at takeoff landing.
00:12:39.832 --> 00:12:42.635
The pilot takes over at landing at
00:12:42.696 --> 00:12:43.336
takeoff.
00:12:43.898 --> 00:12:44.577
In the instance,
00:12:44.597 --> 00:12:46.340
something unexpected happens.
00:12:46.419 --> 00:12:49.663
Nobody says the autopilot replaced the
00:12:49.703 --> 00:12:50.183
pilot.
00:12:51.091 --> 00:12:52.793
His or her interventions are fewer,
00:12:52.854 --> 00:12:54.654
better leveraged, and at higher stakes.
00:12:54.754 --> 00:12:56.456
It allows them to be more present for
00:12:56.496 --> 00:12:58.278
when the other problems that can happen.
00:12:58.798 --> 00:13:00.480
And so that's the architecture for
00:13:00.500 --> 00:13:03.142
healthcare AI that I really, really like.
00:13:03.582 --> 00:13:05.264
It allows the therapist to be on
00:13:05.344 --> 00:13:05.985
autopilot.
00:13:06.424 --> 00:13:08.206
The system manages the workflow.
00:13:08.226 --> 00:13:10.369
The clinician manages the decision.
00:13:10.428 --> 00:13:11.990
It manages the human behavior.
00:13:12.269 --> 00:13:13.171
interactions.
00:13:13.630 --> 00:13:15.673
This idea of very much every time we
00:13:15.692 --> 00:13:16.693
have high technology,
00:13:16.714 --> 00:13:17.995
we have to have high touch.
00:13:18.054 --> 00:13:21.758
And so automation allows the therapist to
00:13:21.798 --> 00:13:26.000
be on autopilot to be more hands-on and
00:13:26.061 --> 00:13:27.081
more high touch.
00:13:28.023 --> 00:13:29.703
The minute you call it automation,
00:13:29.724 --> 00:13:32.025
you've already really started to design
00:13:32.046 --> 00:13:34.408
the wrong outcome, in my opinion.
00:13:35.678 --> 00:13:37.139
One phrase that stuck out was,
00:13:37.240 --> 00:13:38.321
and this feels like it could be on
00:13:38.341 --> 00:13:39.681
a bumper sticker or a T-shirt or an
00:13:39.740 --> 00:13:41.743
ad campaign, was AI drafts,
00:13:42.462 --> 00:13:43.744
clinicians decide.
00:13:44.443 --> 00:13:45.985
Why is that line in the sand so
00:13:46.024 --> 00:13:48.186
important for healthcare leaders designing
00:13:48.745 --> 00:13:52.087
or implementing these AI systems?
00:13:52.447 --> 00:13:55.210
Because generating a note is the easy
00:13:55.289 --> 00:13:56.210
ninety percent.
00:13:56.269 --> 00:13:58.991
The question that earns trust is how you
00:13:59.032 --> 00:14:00.533
confirm that it's true.
00:14:01.567 --> 00:14:01.967
You know,
00:14:01.988 --> 00:14:03.950
a clinician who reviews what the model
00:14:03.990 --> 00:14:06.373
produced and signs it isn't a rubber
00:14:06.432 --> 00:14:06.932
stamp.
00:14:07.394 --> 00:14:09.076
She's an accountable professional
00:14:09.375 --> 00:14:10.658
exercising judgment.
00:14:10.677 --> 00:14:12.679
A clinician who signs without reviewing is
00:14:12.759 --> 00:14:14.481
ratifying, not verifying.
00:14:14.522 --> 00:14:14.942
Right.
00:14:15.823 --> 00:14:18.086
And the liability sits with the clinic
00:14:18.167 --> 00:14:19.769
clinician either way from a legal
00:14:19.788 --> 00:14:20.349
standpoint.
00:14:21.129 --> 00:14:22.350
So AI drafts,
00:14:22.410 --> 00:14:24.432
clinicians decide isn't a slogan,
00:14:24.451 --> 00:14:25.772
it's a design principle.
00:14:26.211 --> 00:14:28.812
It forces accountability into the workflow
00:14:29.274 --> 00:14:32.235
rather than bolting it on after the fact.
00:14:32.725 --> 00:14:32.924
You know,
00:14:33.004 --> 00:14:35.525
any system that doesn't build verification
00:14:35.586 --> 00:14:38.287
as the product, not generation, you know,
00:14:38.326 --> 00:14:40.226
as a malpractice machine, you know,
00:14:40.267 --> 00:14:42.107
dressed up with efficiency software,
00:14:42.168 --> 00:14:42.427
right?
00:14:43.628 --> 00:14:45.129
I won't work with one and I won't
00:14:45.188 --> 00:14:46.428
recommend working with one.
00:14:46.469 --> 00:14:47.808
I mean, that's just the key.
00:14:47.849 --> 00:14:49.789
You have to really let clinicians be
00:14:49.809 --> 00:14:54.711
clinicians and not, you know, defer to AI.
00:14:54.750 --> 00:14:55.672
There's a great saying,
00:14:55.711 --> 00:14:56.812
and it's absolutely true,
00:14:56.831 --> 00:14:57.532
and I've said it,
00:14:57.572 --> 00:14:59.133
and that is that AI doesn't have a
00:14:59.173 --> 00:14:59.712
bad day.
00:15:00.413 --> 00:15:02.076
Well, that's exactly right.
00:15:02.115 --> 00:15:03.298
But clinicians do.
00:15:03.839 --> 00:15:05.442
And when clinicians have a bad day,
00:15:05.481 --> 00:15:06.844
their notes aren't going to all of a
00:15:06.884 --> 00:15:09.128
sudden reflect a good day.
00:15:09.467 --> 00:15:11.591
And so you need verification and you need
00:15:11.652 --> 00:15:13.634
the therapist to actively engage them.
00:15:14.565 --> 00:15:15.504
All right,
00:15:15.585 --> 00:15:17.725
if a healthcare CEO and operator called
00:15:17.765 --> 00:15:18.647
you tomorrow and said, hey,
00:15:18.687 --> 00:15:20.347
we're investing heavily in AI,
00:15:21.067 --> 00:15:23.428
what's the one question you'd ask to have
00:15:23.469 --> 00:15:25.809
them reveal whether or not they're
00:15:25.850 --> 00:15:27.650
building something that restores humanity
00:15:27.730 --> 00:15:30.331
or just another productivity tool?
00:15:32.149 --> 00:15:33.770
Yeah, I would say,
00:15:33.791 --> 00:15:35.871
are you measuring your AI scribe and your
00:15:35.912 --> 00:15:39.493
investment in AI by the patient face time
00:15:39.513 --> 00:15:42.374
with the therapist or by how efficient or
00:15:42.475 --> 00:15:45.135
throughput or how many visits per day?
00:15:45.576 --> 00:15:45.735
You know,
00:15:45.755 --> 00:15:48.537
you're not seeing board decks with patient
00:15:48.576 --> 00:15:49.837
face time and outcomes.
00:15:49.857 --> 00:15:51.839
You're seeing board decks with visits per
00:15:51.879 --> 00:15:52.899
day efficiency.
00:15:52.999 --> 00:15:54.220
And oh, yeah,
00:15:54.240 --> 00:15:55.720
we're a better workplace because our
00:15:55.759 --> 00:15:57.561
therapists don't have to do work at home.
00:15:57.600 --> 00:15:59.682
And so therefore we're trying to solve,
00:16:00.101 --> 00:16:01.682
you know, retention and turnover.
00:16:02.142 --> 00:16:04.042
How about changing the narrative a little
00:16:04.062 --> 00:16:06.263
bit and using AI to help therapists
00:16:06.302 --> 00:16:08.003
produce better outcomes and more effective
00:16:08.062 --> 00:16:10.984
time with their patients as opposed to the
00:16:11.004 --> 00:16:12.043
efficiency trap?
00:16:13.423 --> 00:16:16.205
If an operator gives me a productivity
00:16:16.264 --> 00:16:18.024
number on how much AI helped their
00:16:18.065 --> 00:16:19.845
productivity, the patients per day,
00:16:19.884 --> 00:16:21.046
the visits per hour,
00:16:21.485 --> 00:16:22.966
or notes completed faster,
00:16:23.586 --> 00:16:26.365
they're using AI to accelerate the very,
00:16:26.427 --> 00:16:28.687
very problem that was burning people out.
00:16:30.248 --> 00:16:30.707
In fact,
00:16:31.048 --> 00:16:33.110
I wrote even a couple of years ago
00:16:35.052 --> 00:16:38.654
in the Substack about how my initial fear
00:16:38.674 --> 00:16:40.655
around AI was that it was going to
00:16:40.696 --> 00:16:43.918
be used as the tool to see more
00:16:44.578 --> 00:16:47.061
patients per day or be more productive.
00:16:47.120 --> 00:16:48.442
I didn't realize how prescient that was
00:16:48.462 --> 00:16:50.124
because that's exactly what's happened.
00:16:50.604 --> 00:16:52.225
You're not hearing about how more
00:16:52.265 --> 00:16:54.707
effective a therapist is because people
00:16:54.748 --> 00:16:56.089
aren't getting the heart of the burnout
00:16:56.129 --> 00:16:56.509
program.
00:16:56.528 --> 00:16:58.049
They're trying to control the symptoms
00:16:58.070 --> 00:16:58.831
through efficiency.
00:17:00.386 --> 00:17:01.307
The money question here,
00:17:02.369 --> 00:17:04.690
and we've heard this before on pitches or
00:17:04.710 --> 00:17:05.431
in ad campaigns,
00:17:05.590 --> 00:17:08.333
if AI gives every clinician an extra
00:17:08.413 --> 00:17:09.433
thirty minutes a day,
00:17:10.335 --> 00:17:12.977
what's the worst thing a leader could do
00:17:13.017 --> 00:17:15.157
with those thirty minutes that has been
00:17:15.198 --> 00:17:15.719
given back?
00:17:16.678 --> 00:17:16.837
Yeah,
00:17:16.857 --> 00:17:18.858
the worst thing they can do is tell
00:17:18.898 --> 00:17:20.398
the therapist that they have to see more
00:17:20.459 --> 00:17:20.979
patients,
00:17:21.378 --> 00:17:23.140
that they have to do more compliance
00:17:23.180 --> 00:17:23.640
review,
00:17:23.660 --> 00:17:25.599
that they have to do more documentation,
00:17:25.640 --> 00:17:27.500
that they have to get online and pass
00:17:27.540 --> 00:17:30.260
their HIPAA course for the year.
00:17:30.981 --> 00:17:34.382
Allow the therapist some time to reflect,
00:17:34.823 --> 00:17:36.282
to think about their patient care,
00:17:36.403 --> 00:17:38.202
to mentor, to free them up,
00:17:38.242 --> 00:17:39.503
to do clinical work.
00:17:40.223 --> 00:17:42.503
The thing that drives people to become a
00:17:42.564 --> 00:17:44.464
PT was you want to do clinical work.
00:17:45.182 --> 00:17:46.943
Nobody ever became a physical therapist
00:17:46.963 --> 00:17:48.104
because they wanted to be an expert in
00:17:48.124 --> 00:17:50.605
documentation to ever do be a compliance.
00:17:50.625 --> 00:17:53.164
They didn't know the minute rule existed.
00:17:53.585 --> 00:17:54.746
It's all of those kind of things.
00:17:54.766 --> 00:17:56.306
I almost think we ought to make therapists
00:17:56.326 --> 00:17:58.386
sign prenuptial agreements when they get
00:17:58.426 --> 00:18:00.126
into the profession their first day.
00:18:00.467 --> 00:18:02.567
Right.
00:18:02.688 --> 00:18:03.728
You know, and, you know,
00:18:03.788 --> 00:18:06.308
really expose them to the negatives around
00:18:06.388 --> 00:18:07.449
all of these kind of things.
00:18:07.469 --> 00:18:10.430
These distractors are going to put them in
00:18:10.470 --> 00:18:10.490
a.
00:18:11.430 --> 00:18:12.830
in a period where they're going to really
00:18:12.871 --> 00:18:13.791
be there.
00:18:14.172 --> 00:18:16.053
It's almost like that could be used as
00:18:16.093 --> 00:18:17.713
part of a burnout prevention program.
00:18:17.733 --> 00:18:18.434
All right.
00:18:19.295 --> 00:18:21.036
If the conversation about AI usually
00:18:21.076 --> 00:18:22.037
starts with one question,
00:18:22.136 --> 00:18:23.778
what can technology do?
00:18:24.657 --> 00:18:27.339
Allow Larry to help you think it should
00:18:27.359 --> 00:18:28.059
start somewhere else.
00:18:28.259 --> 00:18:30.122
What should the technology give back?
00:18:30.162 --> 00:18:31.622
Because if AI only makes clinicians
00:18:31.782 --> 00:18:32.442
faster,
00:18:32.462 --> 00:18:34.144
I feel like you think we've missed the
00:18:34.183 --> 00:18:34.544
point.
00:18:34.844 --> 00:18:36.325
If it gives them back their attention,
00:18:36.365 --> 00:18:37.405
presence, humanity,
00:18:37.766 --> 00:18:39.547
then maybe technology becomes the thing
00:18:39.567 --> 00:18:40.587
that helps us care more.
00:18:41.048 --> 00:18:41.428
Again,
00:18:41.689 --> 00:18:43.150
if today's conversation challenged the way
00:18:43.170 --> 00:18:44.171
you think and made you a little
00:18:44.211 --> 00:18:45.230
uncomfortable, good.
00:18:45.392 --> 00:18:46.011
That's the point.
00:18:46.612 --> 00:18:48.413
Subscribe to The Operator on Substack.
00:18:48.713 --> 00:18:50.976
And this is part one of a series
00:18:51.016 --> 00:18:52.396
called Call to Care in the Age of
00:18:52.457 --> 00:18:53.017
AI series,
00:18:53.377 --> 00:18:56.940
which will lead into a re-release of some
00:18:56.980 --> 00:18:57.621
literature as well.
00:18:57.641 --> 00:18:58.701
You want to front tease that?
00:18:59.517 --> 00:19:00.297
Yeah, absolutely.
00:19:00.356 --> 00:19:01.617
So Call to Care was a book I
00:19:01.637 --> 00:19:02.898
wrote in two thousand twenty,
00:19:03.098 --> 00:19:05.299
giving humanity health care back to.
00:19:06.000 --> 00:19:09.082
And it's really how we can take positive
00:19:09.122 --> 00:19:10.942
psychology and the social science,
00:19:10.962 --> 00:19:14.183
social neuroscience and understand that
00:19:14.223 --> 00:19:16.905
the soft skills in health care are the
00:19:16.965 --> 00:19:17.726
hard skills.
00:19:17.786 --> 00:19:19.067
And those are the ones that make a
00:19:19.166 --> 00:19:20.948
huge difference on patient outcomes.
00:19:21.708 --> 00:19:23.788
And so you'll see it's expanded with some
00:19:23.890 --> 00:19:26.931
additional chapters on AI, of all things,
00:19:27.010 --> 00:19:28.051
and virtual health,
00:19:28.092 --> 00:19:29.972
which didn't exist even in two thousand
00:19:30.012 --> 00:19:30.373
twenty,
00:19:30.913 --> 00:19:32.494
along with some new psychological
00:19:32.535 --> 00:19:34.695
principles that have stood the test of
00:19:34.736 --> 00:19:36.336
time from an intervention standpoint,
00:19:36.376 --> 00:19:38.478
including implementation intentions,
00:19:38.838 --> 00:19:40.700
some additional things on mindfulness,
00:19:41.339 --> 00:19:43.000
how to be mindful without feeling like you
00:19:43.020 --> 00:19:43.942
always have to meditate.
00:19:44.602 --> 00:19:46.844
And some other areas that I think people
00:19:46.864 --> 00:19:47.345
will chant.
00:19:47.365 --> 00:19:48.385
So at the end of the day,
00:19:48.405 --> 00:19:49.946
the book's got about twenty five percent
00:19:49.967 --> 00:19:51.749
expanded and updated on material.
00:19:51.769 --> 00:19:52.769
So very excited about it.
00:19:52.789 --> 00:19:53.391
All right.
00:19:53.431 --> 00:19:54.070
More to come with that.
00:19:54.432 --> 00:19:56.153
Until next time, keep operating.
00:19:57.074 --> 00:19:57.714
Absolutely.