A recent study estimated the prevalence of ambient artificial intelligence (AI) documentation tool adoption among U.S. hospitals using Epic electronic health record (EHR) systems, revealing that 62.6% of Epic hospitals had adopted these tools by June 2025. The cross-sectional observational study assessed data from 2,784 Epic users among 6,561 hospitals, linking adoption rates to various hospital characteristics from the American Hospital Association Annual Survey (2012-2023). Findings indicate that adoption rates are significantly higher in metropolitan areas, nonprofit hospitals, and those with strong operating margins. Additionally, hospitals with higher workload levels showed increased ambient AI adoption, suggesting a potential correlation between financial performance and technology uptake. This uneven adoption raises concerns about health care disparities, emphasizing the need for further research into its impact on clinician outcomes and care quality. Policymakers may need to implement strategies to facilitate equitable AI deployment across hospitals, particularly those with limited resources.
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