Tag: Microsoft

Microsoft Dragon Copilot Gets AI Upgrades

Posted on by Jason Barry

Microsoft might have had the biggest presence at the biggest health IT conference, and it made sure all the lights in Las Vegas were on Dragon Copilot. 

Unify. Simplify. Scale. Microsoft’s theme at HIMSS was all about making Dragon Copilot a one-stop-shop for information within clinical workflows. It debuted several new capabilities at the show:

  • Integrated medical content from trusted sources
  • Partner-powered AI apps and agents
  • Proactive ICD‑10 specificity suggestions
  • Expanded role-based experiences for physicians, nurses, and radiologists

Partnering is quicker than building. Rather than developing every Dragon Copilot capability in-house, Microsoft has been leaning on outside partners to round out the platform.

  • Dragon Copilot’s clinical evidence feature is a prime example. It brings medical content and other relevant contextual information in-workflow, all curated through new partnerships with Wolters Kluwer, Elsevier, and other vetted sources.

Microsoft Marketplace fills the gaps. It allows users to add AI partner apps directly into their Dragon Copilot workflows. Picture a modular side panel with insights from folks like: 

  • Regard – surfaces comorbidities and relevant diagnoses 
  • Canary Speech – analyzes voice biomarkers for mental health conditions
  • Humata Health – automates prior authorization processes for clinicians 
  • Atropos – generates personalized real-world evidence 
  • Optum – identifies potential coverage issues and supports claims processing 

All roads lead to scribes. When Microsoft first acquired Nuance for $20M back in 2022, it was its second largest acquisition ever behind LinkedIn, and the core offerings were radiology report automation, dictation, and transcription (with humans still pulling a ton of weight).

  • The product formerly known as Dragon Ambient eXperience is now the backbone of Dragon Copilot, and it’s been adding features at a breakneck pace.
  • Microsoft is looking to make Dragon Copilot everything, everywhere, all at once, and so far new partnerships have been the key to making that happen.

The Takeaway

As every digital health company rushes to add scribing to their platform, the OG scribe is rushing to add everything else. Now it just needs to maintain a unified user eXperience.

Microsoft MAI-DxO and the Path to Medical Superintelligence

Posted on by Jason Barry

In an action-packed week to kick off the second half of the year, no story grabbed more headlines than Microsoft’s MAI-DxO proving four times more successful than human doctors at diagnosing complex diseases.

Microsoft is on the path to medical superintelligence… at least according to their excellent blog post outlining its new MAI Diagnostic Orchestrator, better known as MAI‑DxO.

  • MAI-DxO acts like a “virtual panel of physicians” collaborating on a case, orchestrating multiple AI agents with specific roles like forming diagnostic hypotheses, selecting tests, and interpreting results. 
  • It then applies a “debate chain” to arrive at an explainable diagnosis, all while avoiding over-testing to keep costs under control.. 

New breakthroughs require new benchmarks. As AI gets to the point where it’s breezing through multiple choice benchmarks like medical licensing exams, Microsoft decided to introduce SDBench to better simulate routine clinical practice.

  • SDBench deconstructs 304 of the most diagnostically complex NEJM cases, requiring LLMs (and physicians) to begin with an initial presentation, ask follow-up questions, order tests (each with assigned costs), and agree on a diagnosis.

Here’s how MAI-DxO stacked up:

  • MAI-DxO: 85% diagnostic accuracy / $7,200 estimated cost per patient
  • OpenAI o3: 79% / $7,850
  • Gemini 2.5 Pro: 69% / $4,800
  • Claude 4 Opus: 68% / $7,000
  • Llama 4: 55% / $4,000
  • Human Physicians: 20% / $2,950

What’s the catch? The human physicians weren’t allowed to use the internet or any outside help, which probably simulates a deserted island workflow more than routine clinical practice. Each of the participants also happened to be generalists as opposed to specialists, giving another edge to the LLMs. 

The Takeaway

MAI-DxO might have the potential to deliver superhuman diagnostics in constrained settings, but that doesn’t mean it’s ready to replace doctors. As Microsoft pointed out in its own blog post, “clinical roles are much broader than simply making a diagnosis. They need to navigate ambiguity and build trust with patients and their families in a way that AI isn’t set up to do.”

Teledoc and Microsoft Team Up

Posted on by Jason Barry

Teledoc Health is integrating its Solo virtual care platform with Microsoft Teams, allowing caregivers to collaborate and conduct telehealth visits without leaving the Teams environment. 

  • The Benefit – The partnership allows clinicians to seamlessly transition between business and clinical operations, reducing administrative tasks and streamlining the virtual care workflow. The first iteration of the platform is expected in early 2022.
  • The Trend – Microsoft continues to grow its healthcare footprint. When Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare launched in May of last year, it was the company’s first industry-specific cloud offering. Microsoft’s acquisition of Nuance Communications added transcription and AI to its suite of healthcare services, and the Teledoc partnership announcement revealed that more new tools are on the way.
  • The Spin – AI of course. Not only will the new partnership lead to more efficient patient care, but it will also enable improved data analytics. The collaboration aims to leverage the artificial intelligence and machine learning expertise from both companies to make continuous improvements to the joint software offering.
  • The Takeaway – Two of the biggest names in telehealth and collaboration have joined forces. Although clinicians already have the ability to securely access clinical data within their EHRs, integrating this information with other platforms has the potential to unlock better patient outcomes. The partnership between Teledoc’s virtual care technology and Microsoft’s collaboration software means that these outcomes could be closer than expected.
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