How MUSC Health found unexpected revenue opportunities with AI Agents

Tight margins have been a longtime problem for academic medical centers, as they balance growth expectations with controlling costs. However, recent NIH funding cuts and caps make it feel impossible to maintain the high standards of research and education that these institutions are known for. 

Healthcare leaders at AMCs across the country are realizing that their growth strategy of hiring new staff members to perform the ever-increasing number of administrative tasks is no longer sustainable, and another solution is needed to fill the widening gap.

In this webinar, Franco Cardillo, Executive Director of Digital Strategy and Operations at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC Health), shares his strategy for growth during times of financial instability. MUSC has embraced AI Agents and AI platform technology to unlock new revenue opportunities at MUSC Health. 

Shifting the mindset

MUSC Health has 760 care locations across the state of South Carolina. It faces many of the same challenges as other healthcare systems in the U.S.: five to 10 administrative staff per one provider, a 28% attrition rate, and over 100 different open positions to fill just within revenue cycle operations. 

Cardillo describes how MUSC Health’s leadership shifted their mindset from “how do we hire more people to do these tasks?” to “how can we leverage technology to change what’s possible?”

To ensure other leaders across his organization understand the value of automation, Cardillo describes how he managed this transition, including:

• Using automation as the default, not an add-on
• Level-setting expectations and explaining the “why” behind the use of automation 
• Changing the conversation around accuracy, ”if we can leverage technology to be 30%, 40%, or even 50% better than we are today, then that’s a huge win.”

MUSC’s approach to leveraging AI Agents

AI Agents—digital workers who can think, learn, and adapt as they carry out automated tasks—have transformed the revenue cycle at MUSC Health.

Enhanced efficiency, reduced administrative burden, and improved financial outcomes unlocked by AI Agents and automation center on three guiding principles that Cardillo outlines:

1. Interoperability: How does the solution plug into our existing systems, workflows, and data architecture to create a better patient experience?
2. Productivity: Which tasks can we automate so that our staff are free to engage in more high-value patient interactions? We want to free up people for the work that humans can do, while AI Agents handle the rest.
3. Scalability: MUSC isn’t piloting solutions for the sake of piloting. Cardillo focuses on finding a solution that works and scaling it across all of MUSC Health’s service lines and regions. 

Keeping these principles at the forefront of its automation strategy has been essential in MUSC Health’s success.

The impact 

MUSC Health has successfully implemented AI Agents for pre-visit automation and financial clearance, automating tasks from insurance verification and eligibility checks to copay collections and follow-ups. 

As a result: 

• Pre-visit completions have increased 88%, from a baseline of 25% before Notable to 47% with Notable
• No-show rates have decreased from 14% to 8% by automating targeted appointment reminders
• MUSC is achieving 52% of time-of-service copay collections with Notable, up 19% from a 44% baseline

“Everything goes back to the revenue cycle,” says Cardillo. “You can’t do anything that we’re doing with technology if you don’t include the revenue cycle.”

Watch this webinar for a deeper dive into these incredible results from MUSC Health. Cardillo shares how MUSC Health and Notable have built new workflows to address unique challenges at the AMC, how technology wraps around the patient experience instead of interrupting it, and the three things MUSC Health is excited about as it looks to the future of what it can achieve with automation. 

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