Giving Compass' Take:

• Bill Siwicki explains how AI voice assistants can be trained to help improve healthcare access by sharing important information like emergency room wait times. 

• How can funders accelerate the development of AI voice assistance for healthcare? What are the drawbacks to this approach? 

• AI inherits the bais . of its creators, find out how to combat AI bias. 

Northwell Health currently is using Alexa but soon will add Google Home into the mix. The provider organization is experimenting with many different use-cases for voice assistants. The big one currently is an Alexa skill that helps users identify the wait times at emergency rooms and urgent care centers that are near a given Zip code.

“You can have Alexa ask Northwell for the shortest wait time near your Zip code or check the time at a specific location,” said Emily Kagan Trenchard, vice president of digital and innovation strategy at Northwell Health.

The skill will give you the wait time as well as the address for that location and direct users to an alternative if the shortest wait time is elsewhere.

None of the voice assistants yet have HIPAA business associate agreements to adhere to the HIPAA privacy and security rule. As the Office of Civil Rights will tell a healthcare organization, however, as long as there are none of the 18 identifiers passing over a clear channel, the organization is safe.

Read the full article on voice assistants in healthcare by Bill Siwicki at Healthcare IT News.