What Healthcare AI Tools Should You Implement First?
Learn what healthcare AI tools you should start with based on your business goals.
It’s no longer “if” you implement healthcare AI into your workflow, but “when”. Healthcare AI is here and those that don’t innovate will be left behind. However, you don’t just want to jump in at random. It’s important to have a strategy.
Truth is, the cost of selecting the wrong tool can be worse than not adopting AI at all. Therefore, we’re going to break down which AI tools you should consider implementing first and why certain tools deliver faster returns than others.
Why does the first AI choice matter?
When a market is noisy, as we see with AI, it’s hard to know which direction to take. The wrong choice can frustrate staff, waste resources, and deliver minimal ROI, thus making it challenging to get buy-in for future AI initiatives.
Your first healthcare AI tool or workflow will set the tone for everything that follows, so you want to prioritize the foundation.
What to consider when choosing your first AI tool
Leaders trying to figure out to how implement healthcare AI for the first time should consider these three characteristics:
Find something that addresses high-impact problems
Consider a tool that requires minimal workflow disruption
Select an option capable of delivering measurable results quickly
Now with those criteria in mind, let’s discuss where you can start.
1. AI telehealth triage: One of the quickest paths to ROI
Whether you’re expanding virtual care or launching telehealth for the first time, AI-powered triage tools should be a priority. Using Natural Language Processing (NLP), these systems assess symptoms, collect medical history, and gauge care urgency with high accuracy—often matching human performance.
Research even shows that AI-driven triage assistants achieve high accuracy in directing patients to the appropriate level of care.
Telehealth removes many access barriers, but routing patients efficiently remains a challenge. Traditionally, nurses manually screen each case. AI triage automates this process, asking dynamic follow-up questions and generating structured, high-quality data for providers to review before the visit.
The real impact of AI telehealth triage
Healthcare organizations that use AI for virtual care will see its effects. One study of telehealth services with intelligent triage found that machine learning models:
Consistently showed better discrimination abilities compared to conventional triage systems.
Drastically boosted diagnostic precision, leading to superior disease identification and risk evaluation.
Accurately assessed and confirmed the requirement for hospitalization for patients needing immediate attention.
Helped optimize clinical resource deployment and elevated patient care standards, including reliably forecasting patients' length of stay.
Organizations that make this AI investment will find that it can help quickly pay for itself through improved provider efficiency and patient satisfaction.
2. Decrease no-shows using AI for patient scheduling
An area where you’ll see some of the highest ROI in healthcare technology is AI-enhanced scheduling. These platforms can use predictive analytics to optimize appointment availability across both in-person and virtual care settings.
The business case for this is relatively straightforward. Data shows that no-shows cost the healthcare industry about $150 billion annually and can also lead to worse patient outcomes. AI scheduling systems can help reduce this waste by sending personalized reminders at optimal times, based on each patient's behavior patterns.
A real-world application of AI-powered scheduling tools
One study examined its application in primary health care settings and found that the no-show prediction model reduced no-show rates by 50.7%. Additionally, the study revealed that AI:
Accelerated patient flow. Patient wait times decreased by an average of 5.7 minutes across the board.
Maximized efficiency gains. By using AI to conduct daily assessments of wait times and automatically reallocate patients to different clinicians, some primary health centers achieved a 50% reduction in wait times.
3. Use AI scribes to tackle clinical documentation
Did you know that administrative burden has been cited as one of the primary drivers for physician burnout? According to Medscape’s 2023 Physician Compensation Report, physicians spend 15.5 hours per week on paperwork and administration, of which 9 hours are on EHR documentation. So, if you’re thinking about how to implement healthcare AI, this is an area that can deliver transformative results.
Using NLP, these AI chat tools listen to patient-provider conversations, automatically generating clinical notes. It can be utilized for both in-person and virtual delivery models.
AI scribes are a win for stakeholders
A March 2025 report published by the Peterson Health Technology Institute reviewed the early application of ambient scribes in health systems. Their task force discovered the following:
AI addresses burnout. A pilot project at Mass General Brigham reported a 40% relative reduction in burnout in a six-week survey. Additionally, another health system, MultiCare, shared that 63% of clinicians surveyed after its pilot reported reduced burnout.
Provider feedback. Some clinicians remarked that ambient scribes “brings the joy back to medicine” and have been “life changing”
Cognitive load. The AI scribe substantially lightened the load for clinicians at Yale New Haven Health, who utilized approximately 80% of the drafted notes. This suggests a meaningful decrease in the cognitive effort necessary to complete clinical documentation.
While more research is still needed, AI scribes are also showing positive results in regards to:
Saving clinician time
The quality and accuracy of the AI-generated note
The patient experience and perspective on the utilization of AI. One patient remarked, “I feel like I got my doctor back.”
Boost outcomes and operations with OpenLoop’s built-in AI.
Now that you know where to focus your AI efforts, it’s time to turn strategy into impact. Start with AI telehealth tools that optimize workflows, elevate patient experience, and generate fast ROI.
At OpenLoop, our AI-enabled infrastructure powers exceptional virtual care at scale. By streamlining workflows, improving provider efficiency, and ensuring patients receive timely, high-quality care, we help organizations stay ahead in a rapidly evolving healthcare landscape.
Ready to transform your healthcare operations? Contact us today to get started.
*This content is intended for general informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice. For guidance on your specific situation, please consult a licensed attorney.