Dec 16
2024
The Healthcare Theme of 2025 Is Generative AI
By Ben Beadle-Ryby, co-founder, AKASA.
As we approach 2025, healthcare and health IT are on the cusp of transformation, driven by advancements in generative AI (GenAI).
To understand where the industry is heading, we spoke with Ben Beadle-Ryby, senior vice president and co-founder of AKASA, a leader in GenAI solutions for the revenue cycle. Ben shared his insights into the evolving role of GenAI in healthcare, the challenges health systems face, and strategies for successful adoption of these technologies.
1. How is generative AI evolving in the revenue cycle, and where do you see it heading in 2025?
GenAI is no longer theoretical in healthcare; it’s delivering measurable outcomes, though it’s in its early days. In 2025, as the technology further matures, health system adoption will follow suit, with organizations embracing use cases like prior authorization and coding. Progressive organizations, such as Cleveland Clinic and Johns Hopkins, are already optimizing operations and revenue yield by leveraging GenAI to process and interpret clinical data more accurately and efficiently.
While GenAI holds promise across the entire healthcare ecosystem, starting with financial operations makes sense due to lower risks and faster ROI. By 2025, expect health systems to rely on GenAI to optimize revenue and achieve operational excellence.
2. How have perceptions of generative AI changed?
The release of ChatGPT in late 2022 revolutionized AI perceptions. What once seemed futuristic is now accessible and actionable.
Many health systems are now exploring this technology. AKASA sponsored a survey of health leaders with HFMA that showed that more than 70 percent of healthcare organizations are actively considering the use of GenAI, with nearly 60% of organizations eyeing it for the revenue cycle.
Initially, healthcare leaders approached generative AI with appropriate caution, wary of security and compliance risks. Best practice solutions that not only have a secure, HIPAA-compliant architecture but have also found a way to tailor and fine-tune large language models (LLMs) to a given hospital or health system provide a clear path to deploying GenAI that is safe, secure, and a value-add.
Generative AI isn’t just another buzzword or a flash in the pan. Unlike older technologies like RPA or early AI, GenAI tackles nuanced, complex tasks, augmenting human expertise. The time may soon come when we cannot imagine conducting business or performing healthcare without GenAI — just as today we cannot imagine working without personal computers or the internet.
In the short term, though, and across 2025, we anticipate widespread deployment and adoption of GenAI in the healthcare revenue cycle as leaders grasp its ROI potential and ability to drive nearly 100% revenue yield. It’s no longer a question of “if” but “how fast?”