Enhancing Patient Portal Communication with AI Solutions

Hospital portals have become essential for patient-provider communication, with usage increasing by 46% since the COVID-19 pandemic. Tim Burdick, an associate professor at Geisel School of Medicine, highlights the challenge of managing the influx of messages efficiently and prioritizing urgent queries. In response, Dartmouth Health clinicians and researchers at the Persist Lab, led by Assistant Professor Sarah Preum, are developing “PortalPal.” This AI-based tool triages messages based on urgency and generates follow-up questions for patients, enhancing response times. The initiative originated from a computational healthcare course and aims to streamline communication, reduce clinician workload, and improve patient care. Researchers are training large language models to classify and follow up on patient queries, ensuring every message is reviewed by a clinician. With the rise of telehealth, there’s a pressing need for effective administrative tools to alleviate clinician burnout and improve job satisfaction while ensuring timely patient attention.

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