AI-powered, voice-enabled digital assistant now in use across eight states, seven medical specialties
Today, Suki announced that its AI-powered, voice-enabled digital assistant for physicians has processed more than 12,000 patient encounters and is now handling 1,000 patient encounters every week. As with any machine learning solution, this volume of patient interactions paired with the 250,000 training interactions conducted prior to launch further strengthens Suki’s AI capabilities in clinical practice.
Since its launch in May of this year, the company has tripled the number of physicians using Suki as part of its initial pilot program practicing within seven different medical specialties, and across eight states. Early indications show physicians who use Suki experience an overall reduction of 70 percent in the amount of time spent on medical notes. In comparison, for every hour of direct clinical facetime with a patient, physicians spend nearly two additional hours on medical paperwork.
“We are proud of the progress made since introducing Suki in May, and excited to be freeing more and more physicians from the arduous burden of medical documentation to focus on their first priority – patient care,” said Punit Soni, chief executive officer and co-founder of Suki. “This growth demonstrates the demand for new solutions that support physicians throughout their care delivery, and work across specialties and settings.”
Suki uses voice commands from a physician to create a clinically accurate note that is then pushed to an electronic health record (EHR) system. Over the past six months, Suki’s pilots have expanded the number and specialties of physicians using its digital assistant, demonstrating the ability to seamlessly integrate across a variety of geographic and clinical settings.
Today, physicians are using Suki in Alaska, California, Georgia, Florida, Indiana, Oregon, Texas, and Wyoming. Suki is now implemented by specialists practicing rheumatology and pulmonology as well as internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, orthopedics, pediatrics, and plastic surgery. As physicians use Suki at a higher rate, it frees up more time in their days to focus on patients, rather than medical paperwork.
In addition to this product growth, Suki continues to develop its technology, integrating with three EHR systems, including the athenahealth Marketplace, with plans to add more in the future.
Suki’s product development has been accompanied by rapid corporate development. The company has nearly tripled its workforce, adding to its wealth of physician expertise and leading senior talent in data-science and security, artificial intelligence, and voice technologies. New hires include:
- Chris Brubaker is joining as the senior vice president of marketing and will be guiding Suki’s marketing efforts. Most recently, Chris was vice president of marketing at Import.io, an information technology platform.
- Mahlet Getachew is joining Suki as general counsel. She was previously the associate general counsel and assistant secretary for Go-Pro.
- Teera Price is Suki’s head of business development and will be leading strategic partnerships for the company. She most recently was associate principal in health care analytics at McKinsey and Company.
- Kushal Vepa is joining as director of sales. He was most recently marketing manager for physician engagement at Intersect ENT.
- Peter Schilling, MD is joining as product manager. A practicing orthopedic surgeon, he is focused on making sure that Suki fulfills the needs of physicians and has a long history of advising technology companies to ensure their products work in the health care space.
- Anish Arora is joining as head of data integrations. He has 16 years of healthcare IT experience including 8 years at Epic and 7 years running his own healthcare IT consultancy. He led the team that built interfaces for Sutter Health’s entire Epic rollout.
“Suki is at the forefront of two exciting innovations, and prioritizes using our team of physician’s clinical experiences to inform how AI and voice-enabled solutions empower doctors to focus on delivering patient care and improving patient relationships, not data entry,” said Peter Schilling, MD, product manager at Suki.
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About Suki
Suki is an AI-powered, voice-enabled digital assistant for doctors that lifts the burden of documentation, enabling them to focus on what they love: treating patients. By using artificial intelligence, Suki is able to be personalized to each doctor, gets smarter as they use it, and is rapidly and inexpensively scalable. Moreover, it is easy to implement and even easier to use, not getting in the way of the physician and the patient. Suki is like having an assistant in the exam room who knows how a doctor practices and, as a result, makes the work day easier. Suki was founded by Punit Soni – a former senior executive at Google and Flipkart – and Karthik Rajan, who previously led IT infrastructure for Salesforce. Its team includes technologists from Apple, Google, Salesforce, and 23andMe, as well as physicians from the University of California, San Francisco and Stanford. Headquartered in Redwood City, Calif., Suki is backed by investors such as Venrock, First Round, Social Capital, and Marc Benioff. To learn more, visit suki.ai, or follow them on AngelList, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter.
