{"id":10514,"date":"2024-12-31T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-31T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/?p=10514"},"modified":"2025-11-06T18:32:48","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T18:32:48","slug":"uw-chws-directors-op-ed-in-the-seattle-times-explores-ais-potential-to-ease-medical-billing-and-phone-tree-frustrations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/2024\/12\/31\/uw-chws-directors-op-ed-in-the-seattle-times-explores-ais-potential-to-ease-medical-billing-and-phone-tree-frustrations\/","title":{"rendered":"UW CHWS Director&#8217;s Op-Ed in the Seattle Times Explores AI\u2019s Potential to Ease Medical Billing and Phone Tree Frustrations"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.seattletimes.com\/opinion\/frustrated-by-medical-bills-and-phone-trees-ai-might-help\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-10517\" src=\"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-300x171.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"171\" srcset=\"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-300x171.png 300w, https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-1024x583.png 1024w, https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-768x438.png 768w, https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-1536x875.png 1536w, https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/5\/2025\/03\/Screenshot-e1743008204668-2048x1167.png 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>\u200bIn a recent opinion piece published in <em>The Seattle Times<\/em>, UW CHWS Director <a href=\"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/team\/bianca-frogner\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Bianca Frogner<\/a> addressed the widespread frustrations patients experience with complex medical billing and automated phone systems. She suggested that artificial intelligence (AI) could play a pivotal role in streamlining administrative tasks and enhancing patient interactions within the healthcare system.\u200b<\/p>\n<p>Frogner emphasized that while AI has the potential to alleviate some of the administrative burdens faced by healthcare providers and patients, its implementation must be approached thoughtfully. &#8220;To begin, we need to have an honest conversation of how to align the incentives of patients, providers, insurers and the technology companies to address patient priorities,&#8221; she said. Read more <a href=\"https:\/\/www.seattletimes.com\/opinion\/frustrated-by-medical-bills-and-phone-trees-ai-might-help\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":435,"featured_media":10517,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/435"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10514"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10586,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10514\/revisions\/10586"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10517"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/familymedicine.uw.edu\/chws\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}