Cautiously Embracing AI in Our Practice

I’ve been in love with optometry for many years and recently celebrated 30 years in private practice. Being in private practice offers so much freedom and control, and I’m excited about the future as we continue to evolve and expand our scope of practice. 

As exciting as that freedom and control is, it can be challenging to run a successful business while focusing on patient care—all the responsibility is often left to the OD. To help achieve that balance, my practice has really benefited from our relationship with VSP. VSP supports us with programs that help with practice management, teams that come in to help train our staff, and guidance to help us to grow. They are passionate about helping ODs succeed, and our partnership has allowed me to devote more time to what I do best: caring for patients.

Working Smarter
As a practice owner, I’m always looking for ways to work smarter. This was especially critical during COVID when we experienced staffing challenges and limited staff availability. I really had to look at the practice and ask what I could do to increase efficiency, minimize the burden on the staff I did have, and work with reduced staff without compromising patient care. For us, the answer was artificial intelligence (AI). Having a resource to offload the burden of answering repetitive questions about hours, location, and accepted types of insurance freed up my staff to focus their attention and energy on the patients right in front of them, providing the service better handled in-person. AI also aided in appointment scheduling, displaying a chat box on our website that prompts for basic information and then refers searchers wanting to make an appointment to our online scheduler. Staff and patients appreciate the improved efficiency, and our adoption of the new technology makes the practice look ahead of the game. 

Choosing the Right Solution
Like many of my peers, I was initially skeptical of AI. I did my due diligence and researched multiple vendors, looked at reviews, and conducted cost analyses. I had vendors come in and demonstrate their products, and ultimately chose the product that I felt was best for my business. I didn't go with the cheapest, but I did go with one that had great reviews, demonstrated a helpful attitude, and provided implementation and training. AI in itself can be intimidating, and most ODs don’t have the time or expertise in computer science, coding, and technical process required to set something like that up, let alone train staff how to use it. It was imperative that I choose a company that would implement everything, provide all of the training, and work well with me and my staff. 

The Future
Currently, we’re using AI for administrative assistance only, but I foresee additional opportunities to leverage the technology down the road. For example, I currently have a live person as a scribe because I haven’t seen an AI program yet that can do it well—integrating with our electronic medical records and making sure the billing, referrals, prescriptions, and ordering of tests are completed appropriately and accurately. In the future, that's potentially going to change because AI programs for scribes are improving. Having AI scribes to document everything in real time would increase efficiency, improve the documentation process, and provide a more satisfying experience for the patient, who would have my undivided attention. 

Diagnosis is another area where AI could assist my practice in the future. Being able to enter a patient’s symptoms and receive a list of potential diagnoses, and then get confirmation that my proposed treatment plan is the latest approved treatment, could save me the time it takes to look in manuals or reference materials for rare symptoms or to validate my diagnosis. I'm not comfortable implementing that technology yet, but I think AI will have a definite place in helping doctors treat and diagnose at a higher level. The judgment process and the personal evaluation will always need to be handled by the doctor, but having access to more data can only help in diagnosis and developing an effective treatment plan. 

As Eye See It, the utilization of AI in optometry is going to be really important. One thing you can bank on with optometry is that it’s an ever-evolving profession. As long as we adapt and change with it, our profession will remain robust—and I’m excited about the possibilities!