AWS launches Amazon Connect Health AI agent platform to automate healthcare administrative tasks

AWS launches a new AI agent platform specifically for health care | TechCrunch

Amazon Web Services announced Thursday the launch of Amazon Connect Health. This AI agent-powered platform is meant to help health care organizations automate repetitive administrative tasks including appointment scheduling, documentation, and patient verification, among other things. Amazon Connect Health is HIPAA eligible and connects with electronic health record (EHR) software. The platform is currently partnered with EHR software providers, data integrators, and patient engagement companies, the company said. This move is not the cloud giant's first in the health care space, and it comes at a time when AWS is increasingly looking to grow its footprint in the $5 trillion U.S. health care industry. The company launched Amazon Comprehend Medical, a HIPAA-eligible natural language processor for unstructured medical data in 2018, and it launched Amazon HealthLake in 2021 which is HIPAA-eligible Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources (FHIR) infrastructure used to organize health data. The company also launched HealthOmics, a bioinformatics workflow, in 2022. Still, it is its first major product offering AI agents -- software that completes complex tasks on behalf of a human -- within a regulatory compliant platform. Amazon Connect Health works with existing clinician software to manage the administrative workflow of providers, like medical history reviews, medical coding, and clinical documentation, the company said. Amazon Connect Health currently offers patient verification and ambient documentation. Appointment scheduling and patient insights are in preview, and medical coding and other features are set to roll out to customers later. The software costs $99 a month per user for up to 600 encounters a month -- AWS said most primary care physicians have up to 300 encounters a month. An Amazon Web Services spokesperson did not immediately respond to TechCrunch's requests for additional information regarding testing and timeline. Outside of its cloud business, Amazon has made several large moves into the health care space in recent years. The retail giant purchased online pharmacy PillPack in 2018 for around $1 billion and primary care company One Medical in 2022 for $3.9 billion. The company has since integrated parts of those businesses into its larger retail and brick-and-mortar operations, including same-day prescription delivery and same-day virtual doctor visits for kids. Using AI to reduce administrative burden in the health care industry -- where Amazon Connect Health is focusing -- has been a popular target for startups even before the current AI wave. For example, Regard, founded in 2017, uses AI to take notes for doctors during sessions and goes through patient data to help reduce administrative burnout. Notable is another startup founded in 2017 that uses AI to reduce burnout by automating intake and scheduling. Larger AI companies have recently moved quickly into that space. In January, OpenAI released ChatGPT Health, a version of its chatbot tailored to answer health questions. Anthropic announced its own health care-focused product, Claude for Healthcare, just one week later. Like OpenAI's product, Claude for Healthcare, gives medical advice to consumers but more like Amazon Connect Health, it also includes tools for medical professionals. Claude for Healthcare and OpenAI's enterprise health care services are built to work with HIPAA-compliant products, while ChatGPT Health is consumer facing and not HIPAA-compliant, according to the companies.

Amazon makes a new bet on healthcare AI, rivaling Microsoft in the doctor's office

Amazon Web Services is expanding into AI for healthcare, launching a new agentic system that can handle patient calls, document clinical visits and automatically generate billing codes. Amazon Connect Health, announced Thursday morning, is the first industry-specific extension of the cloud giant's Amazon Connect system for call centers, which crossed the milestone of a $1 billion annual revenue run rate last year. It will compete in part with rival Microsoft, which acquired Nuance for $19.7 billion in 2022 and has embedded its DAX Copilot ambient documentation tool into major electronic health record systems. AI scribe startups have raised hundreds of millions of dollars to automate clinical documentation. Amazon is pitching Amazon Connect Health as a broader solution that spans the full healthcare workflow, from the initial phone call through the post-visit billing code. The idea is to "not provide just point solutions, point tools, or a collection of capabilities, but think end-to-end about what is the customer problem, and how can we solve it," said Rajiv Chopra, AWS vice president of Health AI and Life Sciences, in an interview this week. Early users of the technology include UC San Diego Health, which handles 3.2 million patient interactions annually; One Medical, the Amazon-owned primary care practice that has used the ambient documentation capabilities across a million visits; and Netsmart, which provides EHR software to more than 1,300 community-based healthcare organizations. Amazon's move could double as a litmus test for AI adoption in healthcare, where institutions have traditionally been slow to adopt new technology. A randomized trial published in the New England Journal of Medicine AI in December found that ambient AI documentation (the AI startup Abridge) reduced clinician burnout and cut documentation time by 30 minutes per day per provider. However, hospitals continue to cite concerns about data privacy, the difficulty of integrating AI tools into existing workflows, and unclear return on investment. Amazon's new product has five core capabilities: automated patient verification, intelligent appointment scheduling, pre-visit summaries for clinicians, ambient documentation that transcribes and drafts clinical notes during the visit, and automated medical coding for billing. It integrates natively with Epic, the largest U.S. electronic health records system, with additional EHR partners to follow. It also connects to AWS HealthLake, Amazon's cloud-based health data repository, which is getting new agentic capabilities to convert records into standard formats. Amazon Connect Health comes from AWS's Applied AI Solutions group, led by Senior Vice President Colleen Aubrey, which is focused on building finished applications for specific industries rather than selling raw cloud infrastructure and tools to developers. Aubrey, who previously built Amazon's advertising business, said at AWS re:Invent in December that her team is putting "agentic AI at the heart of everything we do," describing the technology as "AI teammates" that can work autonomously on behalf of businesses. Healthcare is the first vertical to get a purpose-built Connect product, but Aubrey signaled that more are in the works. Separately, the group oversees Amazon's Just Walk Out retail technology and is developing agentic AI tools for supply chain planning and life sciences. Amazon Connect Health is available in preview starting Thursday.

Amazon's AI could soon help run your doctor's office

Amazon's new healthcare tools aim to cut paperwork and speed up patient care. The company's cloud division, Amazon Web Services (AWS), has announced Amazon Connect Health, a new set of AI tools designed to help hospitals and clinics handle everyday tasks like appointment scheduling, patient questions, and medical documentation. If that sounds boring, that's kind of the point. You see, a lot of healthcare today is slowed down by paperwork and administrative work. Doctors and nurses often spend hours filling forms, updating records, and dealing with scheduling logistics. Amazon's pitch is that AI can take over much of that work, so medical staff can focus more on patients instead. AI that helps with appointments, notes, and patient requests Think of Amazon Connect Health as a digital assistant for healthcare providers. The system can help schedule appointments, verify patient information, and answer common patient questions before someone even speaks to a human staff member. It can also help doctors during and after appointments. The AI can listen to conversations between doctors and patients, summarize the discussion, and generate medical notes automatically. Those notes can then be converted into billing codes, patient records, or other tasks that usually require additional manual work. The platform also connects with existing electronic health record systems. That means it can gather information about a patient ahead of an appointment and present a quick summary to the doctor. Instead of digging through files, the doctor can walk into the room already briefed on the patient's history. Recommended Videos For patients, the changes might show up in smaller ways, such as faster appointment scheduling, quicker responses to questions, and less time spent on hold with hospital call centers. Amazon says the goal isn't to replace doctors or nurses, but to remove the administrative burden around healthcare. And if the system works as intended, AI could quietly handle the background work while genuinely leaving healthcare professionals with more time to actually treat people.

AWS introduces Amazon Connect Health with AI agents to reduce administrative burden in healthcare - SiliconANGLE

AWS introduces Amazon Connect Health with AI agents to reduce administrative burden in healthcare Amazon Web Services Inc. today announced the launch of Amazon Connect Health, a new agentic artificial intelligence solution focused on reducing administrative workloads for healthcare providers while improving how patients access care. The platform is designed to automate routine operational tasks, including patient verification, appointment scheduling, medical history review, clinical documentation and medical coding. AWS says that allows clinicians and care teams to focus more time on patient treatment rather than administrative work. The new offering builds on the company's existing Amazon Connect cloud contact center platform and integrates directly with electronic health record systems used by hospitals and clinics. AWS says that its goal is to simplify interactions across the healthcare system by using AI agents to handle common operational processes that typically require multiple systems and manual coordination. The problem the solution is seeking to address is a real one: administrative complexity. According to AWS, staff in large U.S. health systems can spend up to 80% of call-handling time manually compiling patient information across fragmented tools. Amazon Connect Health addresses this problem with AI agents that operate around the clock that allow patients to interact with healthcare providers through natural language conversations. The system can verify patient identity, check insurance details, review availability and book appointments while the patient remains on the line and can, when necessary, escalate interactions to human staff for complex or sensitive issues. The platform also goes beyond scheduling and call handling, as before appointments, the system reviews a patient's medical history across different care settings and generates a summary of relevant information for clinicians. During patient visits, Amazon Connect Health can transcribe conversations between doctors and patients and generate draft clinical notes in real time for provider review. After visits, the system can generate patient-friendly summaries and automatically prepare medical billing codes tied to documented evidence. In early testing, the results have been positive, with UC San Diego Health, which manages more than 3 million patient interactions each year across dozens of contact centers, reporting saving roughly one minute per call using the system. That figure by itself doesn't sound that impressive, but cumulatively, Amazon Connect Health saved the organization 630 hours weekly from patient verification to direct patient assistance and reduced call abandonment rates by 30% and as high as 60% in some departments. For transparency and oversight, Amazon Connect Health includes an evidence mapping feature that links every AI-generated output to its original source, such as a conversation transcript, medical record entry or billing guideline. AWS says that approach allows clinicians to verify quickly how recommendations or summaries were generated before approving them. The launch is the first AWS solution purpose-built specifically for healthcare providers and their patients. The company positions the platform as a way to streamline care operations while reducing friction for both clinicians and patients.

AWS launches Amazon Connect Health AI to cut medical paperwork

Amazon Web Services launched Amazon Connect Health, an AI agent platform for healthcare organizations. The platform aims to automate administrative tasks including appointment scheduling, documentation, and patient verification. Amazon Connect Health is HIPAA-eligible and integrates with electronic health record (EHR) software. This is AWS's first major product offering AI agents within a regulatory compliant platform. The software costs $99 per month per user for up to 600 encounters. Current features include patient verification and ambient documentation, while appointment scheduling and medical coding are in preview or set to roll out later. AWS has previously launched other healthcare products, including Amazon Comprehend Medical in 2018, Amazon HealthLake in 2021, and HealthOmics in 2022. Amazon purchased PillPack in 2018 and One Medical in 2022. In January, OpenAI released ChatGPT Health, a consumer-facing chatbot tailored to answer health questions. One week later, Anthropic announced Claude for Healthcare, which offers tools for both consumers and medical professionals.

AWS Launches Agentic AI for Doctors' Offices | PYMNTS.com

By completing this form, you agree to receive marketing communications from PYMNTS and to the sharing of your information with our sponsor, if applicable, in accordance with our Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions. The new Amazon Connect Health handles patient verification, scheduling, medical histories, documentation and coding, the company said in a Thursday (March 5) blog post. This purpose-built solution is designed to automate these tasks that currently take up as much as 80% of the time staff at large health systems spend on calls, according to the post. Amazon Connect Health integrates with Electronic Health Records (EHR), appointment management, patient medical history reviews, clinical documentation and medical coding, while keeping humans in control, the post said. The solution is fluent in natural language and can book appointments instantly, at any time of day, per the post. "Imagine a patient calls and says, 'I want to see my doctor after work next week,'" Colleen Aubrey, senior vice president, AWS Applied AI Solutions, said in the post. "Amazon Connect Health understands the reason for the call, the patient's context, and their preferences. It confirms who the patient is, checks their insurance, reviews patient and provider availability -- and books the appointment while the patient is still on the line." If the patient has a medical concern or a complex request, the AI solution escalates the call to staff, according to the post. Amazon Connect Health also reviews a patient's medical history and surfaces insights before the visit; transcribes the doctor-patient conversation (with the patient's permission) and drafts clinical notes during the visit; and generates after-visit summaries and the medical codes needed for billing after the visit, per the post. The primary care organization Amazon One Medical is already using the solution. Aubrey said in the post that "the results speak for themselves: ambient documentation now spans more than a million visits, with strong clinician adoption and regular weekly usage." Amazon Connect Health is built on AWS' AI-powered customer experience solution, Connect, and a real-time connection to the EHR, according to the post. The company launched Connect in 2017, saying the cloud-based contact center service makes it easy for any business to deliver customer service at lower cost. It added generative AI capabilities to Connect in 2023.

Amazon Launches Agentic AI Service to Reduce Administrative Burdens in Healthcare

Amazon Web Services is launching Amazon Connect Health, an agentic artificial-intelligence service aimed at cutting down on administrative burdens in healthcare. The AI agent will be integrated with healthcare providers' electronic health records and will be able to review medical histories, check insurance, take notes, and schedule appointments, Amazon Senior Vice President Colleen Aubrey wrote in a Thursday blog post. Connect Health was built using AWS's Connect, the company's artificial intelligence customer service solution. Amazon One Medical, Amazon's primary healthcare service, has led deployment of Amazon Connect Health in clinical settings, the company said. It has also partnered with UC San Diego Health and Netsmart, a healthcare technology company. Early deployments have cut down on phone call times, reduced call abandonment rates, and raised ambient documentation adoption. Earlier this year, One Medical launched Health AI, an agentic AI assistant for patients that can give health advice, explain lab results, manage medications, and book appointments. Write to Elias Schisgall at [email protected]

Amazon Connect Health explained: The new healthcare AI agent by AWS

Last month, I caught a bug or allergy of some kind which had me coughing badly for weeks. I don't know about the severity but it was annoying. What was even more annoying was trying to find a decent ENT in my area and then once I found him, I had to figure out the medicines because by the time I had gotten home, I forgot which one was which and the writing on the prescription was too illegible to be helpful. Ever since, I've wondered why AI health tools don't focus on connecting us with professional help rather than trying to replace it. That's exactly the problem AWS is looking to solve with Amazon Connect Health. Also read: Is ChatGPT Health safe? Study finds AI missed half of medical emergencies Rather than playing doctor, Amazon Connect Health is designed to be the administrative layer that sits between patients and the care they need. Think of it less like ChatGPT diagnosing your symptoms and more like a highly efficient personal assistant who knows your medical history, speaks fluent insurance, and never puts you on hold. The system integrates directly with Electronic Health Records (EHRs) to handle the unglamorous but critical work: verifying your identity, checking your insurance, finding appointment slots that actually fit your schedule, and compiling your medical history before your doctor even walks into the room. If you had used something like this during your ENT hunt, you could have described your symptoms once, had the system surface available specialists in your area covered by your insurance, and booked the first available slot all in a single call. Also read: Cochlear Nucleus Nexa: The world's first smart hearing system The post-visit chaos you experienced - arriving home with a prescription you can't read and no memory of which medication does what - is also squarely in Amazon Connect Health's sights. After every appointment, the system generates patient-friendly after-visit summaries for your provider to review and share. Not clinical notes full of jargon, but plain-language breakdowns of what was discussed, what was prescribed, and what happens next. There is a meaningful difference between an AI that tries to diagnose you and one that helps you actually access care. The former carries enormous risk, a misread symptom, a missed red flag. The latter carries enormous value precisely because it stays in its lane. Amazon Connect Health is built on the premise that the healthcare system's biggest failure isn't a lack of medical knowledge; it's a failure of logistics. Early results back this up. UC San Diego Health reduced call abandonment rates by 30% after deployment, and providers using the ambient documentation feature are spending measurably less time on paperwork and more time with patients. Healthcare AI that earns trust won't do so by replacing doctors. It will do so by making sure you can actually get to one and that when you leave, you understand exactly what they told you.