It’s easy to catastrophize artificial intelligence (AI) and the threat it poses not only to the job market, but to the world as we know it. With all the talk on podcasts and news interviews about whose jobs will be replaced by AI in the not-so-distant future, it can be hard to take a leveled approach to what AI could actually mean.  

The mental health field is one area in which the AI question is particularly salient, as debates rage over whether chatbots and computer models will replace human clinicians. What if all of this is centered around the wrong question? What if the true promise of AI isn’t in replacing people, but in making them even more important? 

That’s what an exciting project at WellPower has begun to demonstrate. How has AI empowered WellPower clinicians to do more clinical work? Read on to find out. 

Mental Health Has a Lot of Paperwork 

Healthcare in general involves a lot of documentation, not only for clinical care purposes but for regulatory requirements and insurance payments. This is especially true for mental health, where duplicated requirements between local, state and federal entities increase the administrative burden on clinicians. Intake paperwork alone can take several hours, and the need for reams of documentation for different regulatory agencies and insurance companies adds time to the admin side of mental health. 

At WellPower, clinical documentation can take up to 10 minutes for every 45-minute session. Time spent on paperwork is often higher in community behavioral health settings because of the complexity of needs we treat, which come with unique documentation requirements. While one-offs wouldn’t make much of a difference, this adds up over time, resulting in admin overload, clinician burnout and less time to actually serve people who need help. 

Recently, WellPower joined the cohort of providers and innovators seeking to change this – to find efficiencies in documentation using AI. 

Using AI to Tackle Administrative Burden 

AI might feature prominently in dystopian sci-fi books and movies, but it doesn’t appear to be ready to take over the world – not yet, at least. Still, there are several areas in which AI performs equally well or even better than humans. Analyzing data sets and reducing human error, for example, are two functions that show great promise. Generative AI – the ability for an AI tool to produce content – is also becoming more effective as we speak. As WellPower started looking for a solution to assist with onerous clinical notes, a partnership with a company specializing in healthcare AI seemed like something worth exploring. Enter: Eleos Health. 

Eleos Health is a platform that uses AI to optimize clinical workflows, enabling clinicians to focus more time and energy on patient care rather than administrative tasks. Integrated AI streamlines the documentation process by live-scribing provider sessions and completing a first draft of notes while the clinician is working with the patient. After the session, the clinician reviews the notes for accuracy, making any adjustments necessary. This is intended to significantly reduce the time required to write thorough clinical notes. 

WellPower’s partnership with Eleos began in 2022 with extensive due diligence and discernment around organizational fit. Experts from the Iliff Innovation Lab joined the project to help address the potential for bias and patient privacy concerns. In May 2023, WellPower launched a pilot with 57 staff to assess initial impact. This pilot showed very promising benefits to clinical workflows. 

In spring 2024, Eleos was integrated into the workflow of a wider group of clinicians to see how the tool performed with a larger sample of clinical roles. This group would have the option of leveraging the platform during their sessions, and then provide feedback on accuracy, ease of use, time saved and more. After one full year of trying out the technology, an in-house evaluation team at WellPower analyzed the data to determine exactly what kind of benefit AI had introduced to the organization’s operations. 

The results were shocking. 

The Results: How AI Has Impacted Mental Health Care at WellPower 

One year after the official rollout of Eleos, the impact was clear: instead of taking up to 10 minutes to write a clinical note, the staff who had been using Eleos were averaging 5 minutes per note. The return on investment (ROI) of using the platform was nearly 1,360%, which translates to $14 in benefits from every $1 spent on the tool, or a 14x ROI – yes, you read those numbers right. Further, staff who were included in the Eleos group showed a statistically significant increase of 3.6% in their service hours – the amount of time spent serving people versus completing administrative tasks – compared to their non-Eleos-equipped peers doing similar jobs.  

What do these numbers mean in practice? For one, a 14x ROI translates to $1.5 million in additional benefits to the organization. These came from a reduction in the time spent on non-billable administrative tasks and more time on providing services. More services not only means for help for people who need it, but also a more sustainable funding outlook for the organization. 

“This kind of ROI is especially important given the changing behavioral health landscape and ongoing potential for steep cuts to Medicaid, both of which threaten the work we do at WellPower every day,” said Wes Williams, PhD, vice president and chief information officer at WellPower. “These results clearly demonstrate just how transformative a generative AI tool like Eleos could be for our ability to serve more people with leaner resources into the future.” 

Aside from the efficiency and financial benefits, the true potential for this technology to make a difference is in the impact on people. With less time being taken up by paperwork, clinicians are able to spend more time and energy serving people. One area AI is still lacking is establishing a genuine, empathetic therapeutic relationship – something at which therapists happen to be especially adept.  

So, it’s not that AI is replacing therapists – at least not yet; it’s that AI is letting the humans do more of the uniquely human part of therapy. 

What Clinicians Said About AI 

And what did staff say about Eleos? Interestingly, the qualitative survey results were very widely split between people who raved about the platform and those who were hesitant. Much of the feedback seemed to depend on the type of clinical role in which it was used: therapists and other office-based clinicians had a much more positive experience than community-based and crisis workers, which suggested interesting areas for further exploration. 

A few quotes from the fans: 

“This tool is life changing for both client and clinician.” 

“It made my note easy to complete.” 

“Really appreciate the way this tool captures and summarizes the session. Feels accurate to the work being done. 

“This tool is next level.” 

What’s Next for AI at WellPower 

Whether we like it or not, AI has arrived in the mental health world, and it’s here to stay. The Eleos initiative has shown exciting benefits for incorporating AI into clinical practice in a thoughtful, intentional, consent-based way at WellPower. As for this specific tool, the evaluation team has identified several areas for further investigation, including the differences in potential use cases – which types of clinical roles could benefit the most, and which might need another solution. 

All in all, WellPower sees a future for AI to add value in a clinical setting, not by replacing people, but by making them even more important. That’s how we’ll continue serving the individuals, families and communities who come to us for care.