Transforming patient care at John Muir Health with ambient AI: Boosting patient face-time by 20% and cutting charting time by 24%

Health system at a glance

John Muir Health is a nationally recognized, not-for-profit health system east of San Francisco serving patients in Contra Costa, Alameda and southern Solano Counties.

HQ

Walnut Creek, California

Affiliated providers

1,150

Facilities

86

Priti Patel, MD, CMIO

Chief Medical Information Officer

Revolutionizing Healthcare with AI

As one of the most forward-looking health systems in the United States, John Muir Health began testing various AI documentation solutions in 2023 to support clinicians and reduce administrative work. The leadership team was looking for technology that could handle clinicians' complex and diverse documentation needs across different care settings and specialties and meaningfully address clinician burnout. 

After rigorously evaluating various technologies, JMH selected Ambience because it was the only solution to navigate all of its clinical specialties, from primary care to pediatrics to oncology, and execute a seamless, end-to-end integration with Epic. Working closely with Ambience and its colleagues at Epic, John Muir Health launched one of the world’s first Epic integrations with ambient AI technology. 

After deploying Ambience across 15 specialties, John Muir Health measured significant decreases in documentation time and feelings of burnout while increasing patient face time. Ambience’s AI platform, point-of-care CDI, and coding improvements also generated enough ROI to justify implementation without asking providers to see more patients.

Ambience has been the most transformative thing we’ve done at John Muir Health. When we were looking at different vendors, we wanted to see which of them produced the best note. Documentation needs really vary depending on the setting…and even within the ambulatory specialty, it’s very different what a primary care physician needs versus what a specialist needs.

Priti Patel, MD, CMIO

Chief Medical Information Officer

Impact

Patient Experience & Satisfaction

1.16
point increase in patient satisfaction for providers with 60% Ambience utilization—nearly 3x the gain compared to providers with lower or no utilization.

Clinician Well-Being & Satisfaction

11%
decrease in clinician burnout (Physician survey data)
86%
of clinicians feel like Ambience increases efficiency (Press Ganey Physician survey data)
91%
of clinicians would feel disappointed if they could no longer use Ambience (Press Ganey Physician survey data)

Clinician Productivity & Efficiency

24%
decrease in time in notes and patient instructions (Epic UAL data)
18%
decrease in after-hours charting, reducing “pajama time” and improving work-life balance (Epic UAL data)
21%
increase in patient face time, leading to 40 more minutes per day, per provider (Epic UAL data)
4%
increase in coding complexity through more precise documentation
5%
increase in wRVUs, reflecting improved documentation efficiency and enhanced billing accuracy

Financial Sustainability

$3,000,000
in estimated cost savings from a 44% reduction in primary care provider turnover, lowering recruitment and onboarding expenses while retaining experienced clinicians

I frequently have a feeling it’s magic. Ambience understands cardiology. It understands arrhythmia, it understands cardiomyopathy–if I say CABG, it knows what a CABG is. The common abbreviations that we use in cardiology, it knows those things and where they fit in. We have a lot of drugs that have awkward names. It knows them. It allows me to listen to the patient, and I don’t have to worry if I’m missing anything for the note. The notes that Ambience generates help with compliance for documentation and making sure that you document the different areas that are required to support the billing. I don’t document at home. I am done with my notes when I leave the office.

Christopher Wulff, MD

Cardiology

The burden produced by documentation is gone, it’s evaporated. The unique aspects of urology that need to be reflected include procedures, kidney stones, multiple cancers, and more. So being able to accurately document those procedures is important. Ambience’s AI models support urology really well and produce professional, readable documentation. Most of my documentation can be finished in the patient’s room, and the coding suggestions are fantastic. Ambience shows all the documentation to support those codes. My wife is an orthopedist, specializing in the spine, and is impressed enough that she’s using Ambience now.

Richard Long, MD

Urology

John Muir Health users on Ambience

Dr. Priti Patel, MD, CMIO

CMIO

Dr. Christopher Wulff, MD

Cardiology

Dr. Salvador G. Guevara, MD, FACS, FASCRS

Colorectal Surgery

Tanya Threewitt, MD

Family medicine

Richard Long, MD

Urology