Health organisations step up their game with intelligent automation technology
The global healthcare industry needs to constantly adapt to provide quality care to its patients – this in a climate of constant change and ever-evolving demands, and with increasingly constrained and disconnected resources, such that was experienced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Thankfully, the use of intelligent automation – leveraging digital workers to execute human roles such as administrative or assessment work– has enabled healthcare organisations to standardise processes across departments and deliver services according to central governance principles.
Intelligent automation frees up valuable time devoted to menial tasks and gives it back to medical professionals to instead deliver care to patients. It is a source of continuous frustration for medical staff that spend hours on paperwork and reporting, often having to re-enter data for separate siloed systems and chase diagnostic documents that could be accessed online through an automated system.
According to research findings by Blue Prism Global, undertaken with a total of 400 senior level healthcare professionals across EMEA, APAC, North America, and the UK, the adoption of Intelligent automation processes in the global healthcare industry has grown steadily over the past five years, from 53% of professionals who were moderate or heavy users of automation five years ago growing to 74% today; only 8% of respondents described the level of automation in their role today as non-existent, compared to 21% five years ago.
In fact, the COVID-19 pandemic propelled digitalisation plans in the majority (93%) of healthcare organisations as they restructured and adapted to deliver care. It was reported that about 58% of healthcare organisations chose to replace paper documents with electronic equivalents, 57% took the opportunity to build new, automated processes that would improve interaction with patients and with other departments, and 45% have replaced in-person consultations with video conferencing– these practices are expected to continue well into the future.
While “cultural adoption” was perceived to be one of the biggest barriers to the adoption of intelligent automation in healthcare, a staggering 97% of respondents expect to see major growth in processes over the next five years. Only 2%, however, said that automation was not part of their digital roadmap.
When asked how respondents would spend their extra time if a large portion of work they currently undertake could be automated, they indicated that the leading activity would be using data analytics to uncover problems within their processes (58%); followed by an increase in face-to-face consultation with patients about their care and treatments (48%); and again, the use of data analytics to understand the bigger picture for population health (46%) and collaboration with other departments and care providers to create joint care plans (39%).
Trusted intelligent automation is proven to add significant value to healthcare organisations operating around the world, including a reduction of manual work for practitioners and better service for patients: these organisations are set to enforce a connected enterprise between patient and treatment providers that ensures long-term quality and satisfaction.
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Category: Features, Technology & Devices
