Blue Shield of California has announced that it is partnering with health services provider Altais and Notable Health to spread adoption of the Apple Watch. The deal will center on doctors wearing an Apple Watch to easily record notes and other data during office visits.

Notable Health is a company that uses technology to ease the process of capturing data from office visits in the medical space, with a key focus on artificial intelligence. The partnership between Notable Health and Altais should make health and wellbeing data sharing easier:

According to Blue Shield of California, the deal with Altais and Notable Health will reduce overhead costs and “enrich” doctor-patient relationships thanks to better data collection and sharing.

Patients who use the Notable Health app can see detailed information about their visit and other health data. Essentially, the doctor will wear an Apple Watch and speak naturally during the office visit, and the Notable Health app will do the rest:

Health Data Management explains how it will work:

This is an interesting implementation of Apple Watch in the medical field, and different than what you might expect. Read the full press release below for all of the details. Paradise Medical Group (PMG) in Paradise, Calif will be first to use Apple Watch and Notable AI technology. 

SAN FRANCISCO and SAN MATEO, Calif., Oct. 11, 2019 /PRNewswire/ — Altais, in collaboration with Blue Shield of California, today announced a partnership with Notable Health to use intelligent automation to enhance the patient experience and automate administrative workflows for physician practices.

Notable’s technology reduces administrative overhead and enriches patient-clinician interactions through better data collection and transfer. Patients using the platform will benefit from a streamlined check-in process using their smartphone—starting with appointment reminders and insurance eligibility checks to self-assessment health surveys that can be pre-populated within a patient’s chart.

During the visit, doctors no longer must type in reams of content to the electronic health record (EHR). Instead, they will use Notable’s wearable technology supported by an Apple Watch, to document physician-patient discussions. The technology uses machine learning and natural language processing to parse the conversation down to its relevant pieces and accurately insert facts onto the patient’s electronic file. Post-visit, the artificial intelligence (AI)-powered technology optimizes charting efficiency by ensuring the proper entry of orders and procedures to generate clean claims.

“Our goal is to help physicians seamlessly leverage technology to improve the health and well-being of their patients—all while reducing administrative hassles and enhancing their professional gratification,” said Jeff Bailet, M.D., president and CEO of Altais. “Notable Health will help us get there with its digital assistant technology that automates manual tasks across any electronic health record.”

Together, the parties are collaborating to leverage Notable’s technology to bring workflow innovation to physicians, beginning with Blue Shield of California’snetwork physician partners. The two companies will continue collaborating together to expand joint functionality over time.

“Deploying our technology will improve data quality and help Blue Shield of California partners spend less time documenting care and more time delivering care,” said Pranay Kapadia, CEO and co-founder of Notable Health. “We know that better data empowers better outcomes, and we’re bridging the data divide between patients, their physicians, and payers.”

For example, doctors at the Paradise Medical Group (PMG) in Paradise, Calif., will soon begin using the Apple Watches and Notable technology to support patients’ visits. PMG is the first Blue Shield partner to use the services, which are now available to network physicians.

“As a general internist taking primary care of an elderly population with multiple complex illnesses, I will now have a maximally efficient workflow, streamlined data entry, and patient input pre-built into each of my patient encounters, and that is extremely exciting,” said Richard Thorp, M.D., F.A.D.P., president and CEO, Paradise Medical Group, Paradise, Calif.

“This partnership with Altais, Notable, and Blue Shield is the kind of transformational change that our medical group believes is needed to revitalize healthcare, invigorate the doctor-patient relationship, and return joy to the practice of medicine.”

About AltaisAltais is a healthcare services company that helps physicians and the clinical community maximize the health and well-being of their patients in a way that is sustainably affordable and maintains professional gratification. Altais seeks to enhance the vibrancy of physician practice and strengthen the heart of medicine – connecting with patients and providing personalized, high-quality care. Blue Shield of California is an investor. For more information about Altais, please visit www.altais.com.

About Notable Health Notable Health is an AI powered health care company that puts the business of health care on autopilot. Founded by serial entrepreneurs, the platform provides intelligent automation to physicians and payers in the industry. Through machine vision, voice and natural language processing, Notable proactively automates away hundreds of manual repetitive tasks like adding diagnoses, orders, templates, billing codes, and more. Based in San Mateo, Calif., Notable is backed by leading investors, including Greylock Partners, 8VC, Maverick Ventures, F-Prime, and Oak HC/FT. Learn more at www.notablehealth.com and follow @notablehealth.