Ambient AI scribes are boosting physician productivity and earnings, but may be contributing to rising healthcare costs at the same time, according to recent analyses published in JAMA Network Open and reported out by Medscape Jan. 16.
Here are five things to know about the analyses:
1. In one of the analyses, researchers from the University of California San Francisco reviewed EHR data from outpatient visits completed by attending physicians at UCSF Health between Jan. 1, 2023 and April 1, 2025. They compared physician productivity before and after before implementing ambient AI. The researchers found that among physicians who used an AI scribe, weekly productivity increased by an additional 1.81 RVUs and physicians completed an extra .8 visits per week.
2. The authors estimated that the productivity gain per physician translated into $3,044 more in annual Medicare revenue based on the 2025 physician fee schedule. The analysis did not find evidence of a rise in billing denials, though the authors noted that they could not assess whether the higher RVUs came from additional clinical services or more accurate documentation and coding.
3. In an accompanying editorial published in JAMA Network Open Jan. 9, researchers from Stanford (Calif.) University School of Medicine said that per-physician revenue gains were “modest,” at about 5.8% more RVUs and 2.8% more patient encounters per week. They also said that the supplemental revenue could help offset monthly subscription fees for AI scribes.
“We now have quantitative evidence that ambient AI scribes can enhance financial productivity without compromising billing integrity,” the editorial authors, Shreya Shah, MD, and Patricia Garcia, MD, told Medscape. They warned against relying on AI scribes “solely as revenue enablers,” as systems may overlook other equally important ROI, including “the indirect gains from reduced burnout and retention risk and the longer-term benefit of building an AI-ready care ecosystem.”
4. Jennifer Goldman, DO, chief medical information officer and chief of primary care at Hollywood, Fla.-based Memorial Healthcare System that her organization implemented AI scribes about one year ago, and has observed a 6% increase in appointments per day alongside a 17.5% reduction in documentation time per encounter. This translates to roughly 5 minutes of saved time for physicians to spend on each patient’s notes.
5. In a policy analysis published in JAMA Health Forum Jan. 9, researchers from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis suggested that improvements linked to ambient AI scribes may contribute to higher healthcare spending and other unintended consequences. For example, an AI scribe’s ability to capture a diagnosis at higher volumes and at more progressed stages may translate into higher reimbursements for health organizations participating in value-based payment arrangements. But the additional spending driven by AI-generated documentation may not necessarily improve patient care, leading to “simply justifying a more lucrative service code for an otherwise identical office visit.”
