There are a multitude of processes that happen each day to ensure the smooth functioning of healthcare facilities of sizes. From large hospital systems, to smaller clinics, there are workflows for everything that keep the establishment running. Whether it’s clinical care, patient monitoring, billing and coding, administration, or IT, each process serves a vital role in healthcare. Many of these processes include tasks that can be repetitive and time-consuming, especially when healthcare professionals would be better suited to focus their attention elsewhere on patients. And while these workflows are important to ensure the safety of patients, that doesn’t mean they are efficient.

We’ll be discussing:

• What workflow automation in healthcare is
• The benefits of workflow automation
• Some of the challenges of workflow automation

Workflow automation in healthcare is one of the best solutions to ensuring that providers’ time is spent giving the best clinical care to patients, and not on administrative tasks that can get tedious. You’ll find automation already making waves in healthcare facilities, especially when it comes to relieving clinicians of clerical tasks, and as much as 80% of administrative tasks are expected to be automated by 2029.

What is workflow automation in healthcare?

Automating healthcare processes isn’t exactly new

Healthcare establishments want to provide the highest level of care to their patients as well reduce any unnecessary costs in the process. For decades, healthcare has operated under inefficient and potentially outdated workflows. Although these time-consuming tasks are designed to help the facility run smoothly and ensure the safety of patients, oftentimes they’re a drain on staff members and prone to errors. Healthcare clinicians’ time is very valuable, but they find themselves having to not only provide clinical care, but complete administrative tasks as well. There are barriers and challenges (such as waiting on approvals) to getting things accomplished quickly, which can lead to delays in patient care.

With the help of advances in technology, many of these time-intensive processes can now be automated. Workflow automation in healthcare refers to using technology and AI to automate repetitive tasks and reduce the amount of manual labor required for those tasks. Lots of facilities have already started to implement some of these tasks to reduce the amount of time and labor spent on administrative duties, but there are all kinds of workflows that can be automated.

Examples of workflow automation

You’ll find examples of workflow automation in all aspects of a healthcare establishment.

• Patient onboarding/management. One of the top processes that are often automated is the patient management workflow. This includes workflows like appointment scheduling, reminders, follow ups, and electronic forms. The integration of EHR records to completely digital and automated means there’s no more manual entry of information, it is automatically synced. When staff don’t have to spend time doing these tasks manually, it frees them up to provide improved care to patients.

• AI notes. Notes are one of the most time-consuming administrative tasks that clinicians may do. They are essential, but they tend to distract the provider from being fully present with their patient during the encounter. Diverting your attention between typing a note and providing care can be difficult. AI medical scribes like Playback Health offer practitioners a way to get more accurate notes because the application transcribes the conversation and puts it into the correct note format. 

• Staff schedules. Roster systems can also be automated, eliminating scheduling conflicts and giving all staff a clear view of upcoming shifts.

• Billing. The healthcare billing cycle can be notoriously error-prone and repetitive. That’s why most healthcare facilities try to include some type of billing automation, but these processes can always be improved for efficiency and greater integration. 

• Inventory management. Automated tracking of the level of medical supplies and other essential items is a great way to ensure there’s never a risk of running too low on something, or ending up with an overstock and not having the room to contain it.

What are the benefits of workflow automation in healthcare?

There are a lot of advantages to increasingly add workflow automation in healthcare

There are lots of ways that automation can improve upon the care that patients receive—and get clinicians in front of their patients, instead of completing administrative tasks. Advancements in technology and AI ensure that formerly labor-intensive workflows can now be easily automated, paperwork is reduced, the chance for errors goes down, and healthcare establishments can treat more patients in less time. AI especially has seen significant growth in healthcare, and by the end of 2025, it is expected to increase in this industry another 40%. Using AI in tools like ambient medical scribes that can sync with EHRs and streamline the patient journey are already improving the lives of doctors and the patients they care for.

If your facility is interested in automating workflows there are a lot of benefits to doing so.

Benefits for patients

• Automated patient journey. Patients want the freedom to choose how they contact their doctor for an appointment, and most agree that having an online option is incredibly convenient. Patient portals are a popular way for healthcare facilities to centralize the communication between patients and doctors. Here they can schedule appointments, request refills, or see the discharge instructions that they may not remember from their last encounter. 

Automating this crucial workflow starts with the appointment, and triggers email/text notifications reminding them about their upcoming appointment. Providers’ offices can then send out any patient forms that need to be completed and signed before the appointment, so all they need to do is approve it once they’re there. Insurance information can be gathered and uploaded to their EHR automatically upon receipt of them. 

• Less delays. When processes are inefficient or there is not enough staff to complete them manually, it can lead to delays in patient care. Patients get frustrated when there are long waiting times, which is often due to workflows that get backed up. 

Another pain point that often experiences delays is with prior-authorizations or approval signatures needed to proceed with care. When there is an automated system for approvals of documents, or information noting that this patient is already pre-approved for a procedure, it can cut down immensely on the delay. The same is true for referrals, having all this information automated allows clinicians to provide care instead of dealing with delays.

• Reduce length of stays and chance of readmission. One of the costliest inefficiencies for healthcare facilities like hospitals is how long patients stay, and the chance that they might need readmission. Lengthy stays might be the result of waiting for approvals, or coordinating the after-care instructions and therapies. Streamlining this workflow and providing better options for staff to communicate their instructions can significantly reduce patient stay length.

The same is true for readmission chances. Patients who are unsure about their discharge instructions, or aren’t educated on the therapies or medications that they might need, are at a greater risk for a readmission. All of this can be automated, and patients will be sent instructions and follow up information automatically upon their discharge.

Benefits for providers

• More face-time with patients. Providers want to spend more time with their patients discussing their concerns, providing treatment options, and answering questions. They don’t want to be bogged down with endless administrative tasks that require too much of their time and attention. Instead, applications like AI medical scribes finally allow them to no longer worry about creating notes as they listen to their patient. The notes are then summarized and formatted correctly, including all the important information about the encounter. Using the patient data, AI can even give insights and make suggestions to the provider about treatment options that would benefit the patient the most. 

• Reduction in burnout. The workload on many clinicians is extremely high, causing them to sometimes compromise their work/life balance to a detrimental degree. Having both essential (but inefficient) administrative tasks as well as their clinical duties on their shoulders is a recipe for burnout. Healthcare workers are stretched thin, causing the quality of patient care to decrease. Instead of manual processes and long wait times for approvals, automated processes can speed these up. Automated workflows reduce the cognitive load of clinicians, so they can focus on their patients’ (and their own) well-being instead.

• Better communication and information sharing.  One of the biggest delays in patient care can come from poor communication and information sharing among healthcare professionals. Without automated processes, different departments and their systems do not “talk” well with each other and the flow of patient data is limited or restricted. Getting access to information often waits on approvals or another manual process. Automation can link up these systems so that information is much easier to share.

Often you’ll find providers waiting on a communication from their colleague, but if that data was accessible by all those who are approved for it, the process can move along much more rapidly. 

• Treating more patients. When workflows run more smoothly with less delays and stoppages due to manual tasks, healthcare facilities can treat more patients. And this doesn’t mean that patients don’t receive excellent care, they do, it’s just that the patient throughput is much more efficient. When patients can move along the healthcare workflow, a greater number of patients can be seen during any one day. This means that there’s a much higher ROI for healthcare systems. Not only are they more efficiently treating patients and giving superior care, they’re also doing so at a cost-savings.

• Easy onboarding/offboarding. Onboarding and offboarding of staff can incur a lot of forms and paperwork in traditional healthcare workflows. However, when it is automated, both employees and the HR department are better connected, so each knows what forms approvals are required to ensure proper access to sites and information. 

• Efficient billing process. Using automation for medical coding is much more accurate than if it is inputted by a human. The AI can include codes that are most likely to be approved by insurance, reducing the chances of denials and additional work. Prompt payment of claims ensures the healthcare facility has sufficient cash flow in order to keep the revenue cycle going. 

Are there challenges?

While there are so many benefits to streamlining the multitude of healthcare workflows, there are some challenges as well. These kinds of applications and system-wide adjustments can be expensive, and require some investment. The budgets of healthcare organizations vary, and some options might be too expensive. That’s not to say there aren’t some ways to include automation for a reasonable price!

Another challenge is the skill set required, and the desire to learn how to use these types of tools so that they are actually helpful, and not a hindrance. The investment of time for training is another consideration.

Are you ready to start the process of workflow automation in your healthcare facility?

There are a lot of ways automated processes can benefit healthcare facilities of all sizes. Many essential tasks for healthcare staff are repetitive and inefficient, and can definitely be optimized with the help of automation. If you want to provide better care for patients, ensure providers aren’t overloaded, and increase the revenue of your healthcare system, consider looking into workflow automation tools.