Major EHR companies, such as Epic and Oracle, are not alone in developing AI writing technology to assist with clinical note taking; Niche EHR startups are also getting in on the action. For example, using Orchid, With an AI-powered mental health EHR, clinicians such as psychiatrists can automate the process of writing clinical notes.
With the permission of the patient and the doctor, Orchid can learn the doctor’s style and can use previous clinical notes to write new ones for continuity of care. Orchid can also summarize medical histories, suggest billing codes and diagnoses, and provide post-visit summaries.
Psychiatrist David Halpern, MD, has been using the Orchid EHR for a few years and has provided feedback on its development.
“The amazing thing about Orchid’s AI is that it learns from what I put into it,” Halpern explained. “So if in my classic SOAP note, for example, I want to put at the top what I talked about with the patient. Then I have a mental status examination template that I created and then I have an assessment and a plan at the end. After talking to the patient, the AI can make an accurate statement of the mental state there. For me, include the appropriate things we talked about above and change the medications below. All I have to do is spend a minute or two looking over it to make sure there’s nothing wrong with it. And it gets better every time and actually shaves off a good five minutes per patient. And if you see one patient after another (two to three an hour during an eight-hour day), that can save you hours of time. It helps me see many more patients.
“It’s a good time financially to be a psychiatrist,” Halpern said, “but I see a lot of people struggling. Many people need help. And the most common conversation was, for a long time, that I am not available.”
That time savings was actually the impetus for creating the company, according to CEO Joe Pomianowski. He noted that traditional EHRs created specifically for mental health tend to rely on outdated technology. Orchid’s main goal is to help automate many administrative tasks to reduce the burden on these doctors so they can spend more time on patient care.
“I am a lawyer by training,” Pomianowski explained. “Many of my colleagues were not able to receive the care they wanted. And when I asked them why, they said all the therapists were exhausted. So here you are my friends. who desperately needed access to vital mental health care and when I contacted the doctors, they told me they set aside specific days of the week just to do administrative work. So I recognized that the only way I could help my friends was if I helped the doctors. reduce their administrative work, and that is what led us to found Orchid.”
Here’s how Orchid describes its solution: With Orchid, doctors can automate much of the clinical note writing process, recording patient sessions (with the patient’s permission), or if the doctor or patient refuses to be recorded, dictating or writing out loud. level notes and let Orchid do the rest. Clinicians can use Orchid’s existing note templates, from SOAP to DAP notes, or use their own template that Orchid can follow. With the doctor’s permission, Orchid’s AI can be trained to the doctor’s style and can use previous clinical notes to write new ones for accurate continuity of care. Additionally, Orchid can summarize medical histories, suggest billing codes and diagnoses, and provide post-visit summaries to increase patient retention. It meets the requirements of insurance companies, making it easier for doctors to accept insurance. Thousands of physicians are already using Orchid’s EHR.
Orchid went through the Y Combinator startup accelerator program. “One of Y Combinator’s mantras is to create something their customers want. And we did it,” Pomianowski said. “We interviewed many doctors. We found that they spent a large portion of their time taking notes. “There are a lot of places where we found we can reduce administrative burdens, but taking notes was a huge burden for them.”
The company started in the New York and Philadelphia areas by reaching out to local doctors. “Friends of mine who are doctors spread the word,” Pomianowski said. “The doctors who were designing the product with us let their friends know. So it grew organically and is still growing organically.”
He said there are additional features, such as e-prescribing, that will be added in 2025.
“We believe we have saved doctors at least five hours a week and they have been able to accept more clients,” Pomianowski added. “In fact, I have definitely helped my friends by introducing doctors to Orchid, so my original goal has been fulfilled: to help my friends. We are backed by investment leaders like Y Combinator and are truly dedicated to leading the charge and reducing “which is a $1 trillion administrative burden on our healthcare system to grow and expand, we will simply remain focused on supporting physicians and improving healthcare outcomes.”
Halpern said his hope for the future is that technology continues to improve and integrate “to the point where seeing your psychiatrist could be like walking in and talking to someone like it used to be before all the check-ins and all that. And it turns out that there is a little bit of AI in the background recording, which creates everything for you and the doctor looks at it afterwards,” he said. “But otherwise, he just takes care of that for you. And that would be a return to the way medicine used to be and should be.”
