Allina Health Sees Early Success From Voice AI in Call Centers
Allina Health Enhances Patient Experience with AI Call Center Assistant
Allina Health, a Minnesota-based health system, is reporting early success using voice AI in its call centers to improve patient experience. The system, which includes 12 hospitals and over 80 clinics, began implementing SoundHound AI’s call center tool, featuring an AI agent named Alli, in January.
Alli is designed to assist patients with common requests, such as booking and rescheduling appointments, and answering general inquiries about hours, locations, services, and billing, according to Michael Anderson, executive vice president of enterprise AI at SoundHound. The company is also developing features for medication refills and doctor/clinic searches.
For complex issues or personal preference, Alli seamlessly transfers callers to a human representative without requiring them to repeat information. “By handling these everyday tasks, Alli helps reduce wait times and lets allina’s staff focus on more complex or sensitive patient needs,” Anderson said.
Minda Garcia, vice president of Allina Health’s customer experience center, said the deployment of Alli addresses growing demands on customer experience staff driven by increasing patient needs. “We want to improve systems to meet our patients where they are by connecting with them in the manner they choose and to provide our care team members with the tools that will allow them additional time to support patients who require greater care navigation,” Garcia stated.
Garcia emphasized that Allina views all employees as care team members, including Alli. While call center staff may not provide direct hands-on care, they offer crucial support and connections for patients to access expert care.
“Alli benefits staff by handling routine interactions, allowing our care team members to focus on complex patient needs that require more personalized attention,” Garcia said.”It allows our team to spend more time doing the tasks they are best trained to do. Alli also allows our representatives to meet the needs of more patients by reducing call times by 5-10 seconds.”
According to Allina Health, patients are also benefiting, with 80% of calls now answered in 45 seconds or less. Data indicates that Alli effectively manages routine requests, boosting efficiency without increasing headcount.
What’s next
Allina Health plans to further integrate AI to streamline patient access and improve staff efficiency, focusing on expanding Alli’s capabilities to handle more complex inquiries and personalized support.