Rotherham, Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust is utilising AI scribe in its older people’s mental health service with an aim to provide better care for older people, including those living with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease.
As part of a trust-wide roll out, the service has introduced the Accurx Scribe solution, which uses ambient voice technology to listen during consultations and provide drafts on clinical notes and referral letters. These are then checked and signed off on by clinicians prior to being entered into the patient record, the trust notes.
RDaSH published a video, showing Sally Jameson, MP for Doncaster Central, during a visit to the trust talking with members of the trust’s workforce about how the tool works in practice and its impact on reducing administrative burden. “It’s been incredible to come here today and see how transformative this technology has been,” Jameson said.
Reflecting on what she had heard from patients with lived experience during a demonstration of the tech in action, she added: “Having that technology just dealing with the notes and everything afterwards really changed the dynamic of the patient and clinician interaction, so going forward I can see how this could have a big impact for the health experience of people across Doncaster and South Yorkshire.”
RDaSH CCIO and associate medical director Michael Seneviratne said: “We want technology to earn its place in our services, so we’re using Scribe carefully and already seeing the difference it makes for clinicians and the people they support. Our clinicians have been closely involved from the outset, and it was a pleasure to show Sally Jameson the work they are doing.”
The trust published an AI policy earlier this year, outlining acceptable uses, practical guidance, and responsibility for the use of AI tools and systems. Lead responsibility is assigned to key roles including the chief executive, data protection officer, senior information risk owner, and clinical safety officer for ensuring policies and procedures support best practice, overseeing compliance with data protection regulations and data privacy, risk management, oversight, and monitoring.
On procurement and implementation for products or systems containing AI features, RDaSH sets out the need to engage with IT and information governance teams, complete a DPIA with engagement from the supplier where identifiable data is to be used or a new system is to be procured, and gain approval from the Health Research Authority for use of AI in research. Outputs must always be subject to human review, and transparency should be ensured for patients and employees.
Practical guidance for clinicians covers the need to validate outputs against clinical evidence and patient context, to document decisions and rationale clearly in patient records, and to report any safety concerns or adverse incidents involving AI tools.
Wider trend: Ambient voice technology
The Health Services Safety Investigations Body (HSSIB) has launched an investigation into the use of ambient voice technology (AVT) in hospitals, following engagement with stakeholders including representatives from national bodies that highlighted potential safety issues. “Intelligence gathered found that adoption of AVT is accelerating while the safety implications are not fully understood,” HSSIB details.
Barts Health NHS Trust is continuing to roll out ambient voice technology to capture clinic conversations and generate patient letters automatically, as part of a national trial. Over 2,000 clinicians now have access to Oracle’s Clinical AI Agent tool across the trust, it states, with 1,350 having used it to date, and 700 using it during the month of September. An initial trial with 250 users at the trust saw clinicians using an app on their mobile phone to record consultations, with the AVT transcribing and summarising information and generating clinical notes to be turned into letters for patients and their GPs “in real time”.
Digital Health and Care Wales is launching a £10 million open framework agreement for ambient voice technology (AVT) solutions, aiming to support the adoption of tech to improve clinical documentation processes. The agreement is intended to maintain a “pre-qualified list” of AVT suppliers, who will have to meet conditions enabling their participation and achieve a minimum evaluation threshold. According to DHCW, AVT solutions could include ambient voice capture, speech-to-text transcription, generative AI summarisation, suggested structured clinical coding, intelligent summarisation, automated template population, review and approval workflows, integration with GP systems, and insights and reporting.
