Artificial Intelligence’s place in chiropractic

Artificial intelligence (AI) isn’t just booming across the consumer market—it’s gaining traction in the healthcare space, too.

Capable of driving a wide range of activities, AI brings together the ability to analyze large and disparate datasets, and to use that insight to identify meaningful patterns among the volumes of information. After examining those patterns against other known data, AI technology can then offer a prediction or suggested course of action. It’s a decision-making methodology similar to that used by humans every day.

In the consumer realm, predictions made by AI tools may tell a retailer which customers are most likely to respond to a discount on a specific product. On the business operations side, an AI platform can sift through data to see where opportunities exist to make better strategic decisions or capitalize on marketplace trends. Healthcare has also seen an increasing use of AI. Patients are now being engaged with highly personalized recommendations around things such as wellness efforts and lifestyle choices.

The technology is also evolving toward greater abilities to drive improved outcomes and increase patient safety. Care providers are beginning to take advantage of AI’s capabilities in areas such as the diagnosis process, treatment recommendations and patient monitoring.

With the growing number of AI tools at their disposal, DCs have many options as they evaluate where the technology can have the greatest impact on their practices.

Stop getting bogged down in billing

Generating, reconciling and auditing patient billing records is a time-consuming process that holds within it the potential for significant (and costly) errors. That’s where AI comes in, bringing with it the ability to sift through huge volumes of data, identify specific words and phrases, then match them to the correct coding and billing parameters.

Patient invoices can be generated with greater accuracy than ever before, and as the AI functionality built into the latest crop of medical billing platforms continues to mature, DCs may discover it’s no longer just the large outstanding accounts that are worth the effort of recovery. With AI powering the process, audits and collection efforts on overdue or disputed payments are likely to become a far more fruitful endeavor.

Streamline the use of electronic health records

Electronic health records (EHRs) are proliferating across the chiropractic sector, but many DCs are still looking for ways to better integrate these systems, to make them faster and more intuitive to use. This would reduce the amount of time providers must spend on documentation and give them a greater ability to focus on their patients.

Incorporating AI into the EHR platform is helping to save time and improve the quality of the data that goes into patients’ records. Some systems utilize AI to identify those data fields that are most likely to be relevant to the provider and the individual patient they’re seeing, for example. Artificial intelligence can also be helpful in spotting inconsistencies in patients’ data, giving DCs the ability to fix errors before they become part of the EHR.

Boost back-office productivity

Artificial intelligence has been lurking in many DC practices for years, quietly streamlining operations and increasing efficiency. Chiropractors interested in leveraging the technology in a more purposeful way might consider implementing speech recognition in their daily operations.

Many of today’s platforms integrate well with standard office software, such as word processing and other programs. Not a fast typer? Speech recognition software can make responding to e-mails a breeze—and a fast one at that. And because the AI powering today’s voice recognition systems has the ability to learn as it goes, DCs are likely to find their speech recognition platform is faster and more accurate every time they use it.

Attract new patients

The majority of DCs have a website, but how effective is your Internet presence at drawing in visitors and converting them into clients? Prospective patients usually have specific questions that bring them to a practice’s web page, varying from whether evening or weekend appointments are available to confirming if their insurance will be accepted to finding out what information is need to set up the initial appointment.

Online tools such as AI-driven virtual sales agents are now available to engage these web visitors, answering many of their questions in an interactive way and keeping them interested enough to make—and keep—that first appointment.