CANTON, Mass. — Fraser Health has reduced average patient discharge documentation time by seven minutes per patient after implementing MEDITECH’s AI-powered Hospital Course Summary within its Expanse electronic health record system, according to the company.
Clinicians at Fraser Health, the largest regional health authority in British Columbia, reported cutting discharge documentation time from an average of 12.5 minutes to 5.5 minutes per patient. Across approximately 1,000 discharges, the reduction translated into more than 100 hours of reclaimed clinical time.
“Documentation responsibilities contribute to healthcare provider burnout, so it is rewarding that providers have found this tool helps reduce administrative and cognitive burden,” said CMIO Dr. Amyeen Hassanali of Fraser Health. “By streamlining the documentation process, clinicians have more time to focus on providing high quality care, which ultimately enhances the patient experience.”
Hospital course summaries serve as a primary communication tool to support continuity of care and safe transitions between care settings. MEDITECH’s Hospital Course Summary uses generative artificial intelligence integrated into the Expanse discharge workflow to automatically extract key information from documentation generated during a patient’s stay and produce a draft summary for clinician review and editing. The summary includes linked citations that allow clinicians to trace the source of compiled information.
“This was an area where generative AI could make a positive impact,” said MEDITECH Chief Nursing Executive Cathy Turner, BSN, MBA, RN-BC. “Instead of providers mining through long and complex documents, the solution does this work, compiling key information to produce a comprehensive summary for the provider to edit and review.”
As a pilot site for the Hospital Course Summary, Fraser Health gathered feedback from clinicians using the tool. More than 95% of users said they would recommend it to a colleague, and 87% reported a reduction in the cognitive load required to create discharge summaries.
“This solution highlights how AI can effectively augment a clinician’s efforts, particularly when working with lengthy records and complex patient information,” Dr. Hassanali said. “Hospital Course Summary synthesizes data faster and more consistently than manual review alone, supporting providers with a more reliable and comprehensive picture of each patient’s care journey.”
Fraser Health provides hospital, community, and home-based care to more than two million people across 20 municipalities in British Columbia, serving approximately one-third of the province’s population.
