(TNS) — Cleveland Clinic nurses participating in a pilot program can ask a conversational artificial intelligence tool plain-language questions about their patients’ charts and receive answers in seconds.
The tool is one example of how artificial intelligence is moving quickly into hospital exam rooms, physician offices and health insurance systems across Northeast Ohio, where it influences how patients are treated, appointments are scheduled and medical records are written.
Nationally, AI tools used in clinical care can predict a patient’s risk of death or deterioration, record and summarize visits, suggest diagnoses and approve insurance claims, according to KFF. Nearly 70% of clinicians now use AI tools daily, according to a 2026 industry report.
Northeast Ohio hospitals are part of the trend. Locally, they are testing whether AI-enabled medical devices and platforms can reduce costs, improve care and produce better outcomes.
But the technology’s rapid growth is also raising questions about accuracy, oversight and how much clinicians and patients should rely on systems that can make mistakes.
The Clinic hosted a daylong conference Friday for healthcare professionals looking at how AI is disrupting operating rooms, primary care, pharmacy services and more.
MetroHealth System is among the latest local hospitals to employ AI. Its new Artisight Smart Hospital Platform — offering virtual nursing and other services — will be rolled out at the Glick Center inpatient tower at MetroHealth’s main campus this fall.
Caregivers can use Artisight to contact a language interpreter who can talk with a patient via the TV screen.
“We don’t have to go find an iPad, make sure it’s powered up and log into the (interpreting) app,” said MetroHealth chief nursing informatics officer Jill Evans. “We can walk right into the room and through the technology, get that interpretation services right there on the (patient’s TV) screen.”
MetroHealth plans to expand Artisight to its inpatient facilities in Parma, Cleveland Heights and the Old Brooklyn rehabilitation center, through 2027, the medical system said.
AI CAN ‘IMPROVE HUMANITY’
The biggest excitement surrounding AI in medicine is its potential to transform the field, Clinic CEO Dr. Tomislav Mihaljevic said Friday during the Clinic’s AI Summit for Healthcare Professionals.
“Everybody sees artificial intelligence as a very unique set of tools that will transform the way we live, but will also transform every industry in the world,” Mihaljevic said. “I think that artificial intelligence has this phenomenal promise to really improve humanity through better access to healthcare.”
The Clinic is starting to reimagine the ecosystem of healthcare delivery in a completely new way, not by layering AI on top of old hospital processes, but by starting with AI first, Mihaljevic said.
One area in which AI is making the biggest day-to-day difference in hospitals is disease management, said Dr. Jorge Guzman, executive vice president, Clinic U.S. markets.
“We’re starting to use AI to identify conditions that have a high fatality (rate), like sepsis, or manage chronic conditions in a way that is more predictable, standardized and automated,” Guzman said.
Clinic caregivers have questioned if AI will replace them, but pilot programs have shown that AI tools enhance and augment the care they deliver, said Kelly Hancock, executive vice president and chief administrative officer.
“I think the more that we continue to include our caregivers in this co-creation of these solutions and these enhancements, the further that we’ll see that engagement go,” Hancock said.
AI PROVIDES CARE AT NE OHIO HOSPITALS
As Cleveland-area hospitals experiment with AI tools for increased cost-saving and productivity, they join the approximately 22% of U.S. healthcare organizations that used AI tools in 2025.
Healthcare AI spending reached $1.4 billion in 2025, nearly triple the previous year’s investment, reported Menlo Ventures, a venture capital firm that invests in AI and healthcare technologies.
University Hospitals recently joined a national consortium of 12 health systems jointly designing AI-assisted tools to help physicians sort through imaging, lab results and patient records faster.
UH already uses an AI virtual nursing platform that it plans to expand to all of its nearly 3,000 beds.
At Akron’s Summa Health, AI will soon analyze chest scans, make specialist referrals and automate supply orders, thanks to new partnerships with eight technology companies.
The Clinic also has a virtual patient companion program for remote, around-the-clock observation of at-risk patients, as well as AI technologies to record conversations between caregivers and patients, generate written medical notes and review medical coding in a fraction of the time that it takes humans to do the same task.
Southwest General Medical Center uses AI to send appointment reminders, fill out hospital admittance paperwork and make notes in electronic health records.
Other AI platforms are quickly filling different roles in patient care.
Scheduling automation can reduce manual appointment booking, while care-navigation platforms manage ongoing patient communication about results, follow-up appointments, questions and care transitions, according to Menlo Ventures.
Other AI tools are aimed at patients, helping people manage their health through biomarker and lifestyle monitoring, tracking and round-the-clock communication. Some tools can also assess symptoms conversationally and direct patients to the appropriate level of care.
REGULATORS ARE PAYING ATTENTION
AI is not foolproof. Its performance depends on the quality of the data used to train it. AI platforms can also “hallucinate,” producing misleading or inaccurate responses or give different answers when asked the same question multiple times. Errors could affect diagnosis, treatment and patient trust, health experts say.
Some healthcare leaders worry that the technology could lead to less emphasis on human judgment and connection, a lack of accountability and harmful consequences for workers.
“The most dangerous trend in healthcare today may be the assumption that AI adoption alone will improve performance, without equal investment in the human judgment, analytical skill, and training required to use it safely and effectively,” Steve Davis, CEO of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, told Becker’s Healthcare, a medical industry trade magazine.
In response to the healthcare industry’s warning signals, the federal government is moving to regulate AI healthcare tools. The Food and Drug Administration recently said that it is considering evaluating generative AI-enabled medical devices similar to the way doctors are evaluated.
“Artificial intelligence is transforming medicine, and the United States must lead in shaping how this technology is developed and used safely and responsibly,” acting FDA Commissioner Kyle Diamantes said in a news release.
The FDA is concerned about generative AI, which uses large language models to interact in a human-like way, including answering patients’ questions in conversation.
Another type of AI, called predictive AI, uses mathematical models and pattern recognition to forecast outcomes, such as which pneumonia patients are most likely to require hospitalization and which treatments may be most effective.
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