Abridge VP of Marketing Guru Sundar

This is our last newsletter before the holiday break, but we’re wrapping up the year in style with Abridge VP of Marketing Guru Sundar on the latest Digital Health Wire Show. Guru’s fingerprints are on some of the best marketing campaigns in healthcare, and he gives us a behind-the-scenes look at the process, purpose, and passion that separates the top brands from the pack. You can’t teach great taste, but Guru might have gotten us halfway there.

Artificial Intelligence

8VC’s Vision for Healthcare AI in America

8VC just dropped its Vision for Healthcare AI in America, and it’s the best roadmap we’ve seen for removing the barriers between AI and its potential to transform medicine.

Great cakes have three layers, maybe four. Before 8VC shared its recipe for how AI can help fix things, it laid out the four main ingredients that it’ll be working with.

• Level 0: Administrative – AI that supports providers in the back office. Example: AI scheduling agents, scribes.

• Level 1: Assistive – AI that assists clinicians but doesn’t diagnose, treat, or triage, or prescribe medications to patients. Example: AI coaches, navigators.

• Level 2: Supervised Autonomous – AI that does all the things that Level 1 doesn’t, with decisions supervised by a clinician. Example: AI medication management.

• Level 3: Autonomous – AI that diagnoses, treats, triages, or prescribes medications completely on its own. Example: fully-autonomous triage lines.

Now for the vision. Most healthcare AI solutions currently live on Level 0. They’re creating real value for providers, but they aren’t going to steer the Titanic away from the iceberg.

• 8VC thinks the other levels might, but not unless we remove the legal barriers that are preventing our innovators from innovating.

Level 1. These solutions exist today, but assistive AI care models are being held back by a lack of broadly billable CPT codes for the services they render.

• Solution: Implement value-based reimbursement for assistive AI care models. 8VC describes a CMMI model with durable codes and case rates, which sounds like something most payors would be lining up to lobby for.

Level 2. All autonomous AI is considered Software as a Medical Device by the FDA, but the current performance bars are set too high. Driving tests don’t need to be F1 races.

• Solution: Align FDA approval benchmarks with real-world standards, not hypothetical ideals. LumineticsCore is a good example – the FDA required the tool to catch at least 85% of diabetic retinopathy cases, but most ophthalmologists land between 33-77%. 

Level 3. Only a few policy changes are needed to open the door to Level 3 once we get to Level 2, the biggest of which is defining AI as a type of practitioner that’s eligible for reimbursement.

• Solution: Amend the Social Security Act to allow Medicare reimbursement for licensed AI. As it stands today, even if CMS created a code for a Level 3 service, it would still be illegal for Medicare to pay an AI company instead of the supervising physician.

The Takeaway

AI is going to have to level up if we want to transform healthcare experiences, costs, and ultimately outcomes. 8VC thinks we can get there if we let our builders build, and it even gave us a blueprint for getting out of our own way.

Enrollment Timelines, State by State

Provider enrollment delays are shaping access to care, revenue timelines, and even workforce strategy. Ever wonder how they’re impacting organizations near you? Check out Medallion’s 2025 Geography of Payor Enrollments to see state-by-state enrollment times, how delays are compounding workforce shortages, and why you should factor this into your 2026 planning.

Using AI to Democratize Performance Data

You’re tracking clinical performance metrics – HACs, LoS, FCOTS, and more – but does tracking translate to better patient care? Watch the on-demand recap of C8 Health’s recent expert roundtable to learn how leading institutions leverage AI to bring quality data to the bedside. Plus: See how this approach saved UTMB Health over $109k in three months.

The Wire

• The Data is Haunted: Transparency laws might be getting payors to publish more prices, but that doesn’t mean those prices aren’t complete trash. A new study in Health Affairs looked at the databases of 61 different payors and found that 92% of the listed numbers were “ghost rates,” or negotiated prices for impossible services – like a dermatologist performing brain surgery. As far as we could tell this is the first study that quantified just how prevalent the problem is.

• Access Agent Makes First Kontakt: Kontakt.io debuted a new AI agent that enables health systems to dynamically optimize room assignments for outpatient care. Access Agent represents Kontakt.io’s first solution specifically designed for outpatient clinics, allowing them to unlock additional capacity without adding exam rooms. The agent leverages Kontakt’s signature real-time location data and EHR integration to improve room allocations, forecast availability, and predict visit duration using historical data.

• Supporting Access to Behavioral Care: A study in AJMC demonstrated how tech that supports referral pathways can help move the needle on meeting the demand for mental health services. Researchers looked into how nearly 13k patients received   inpatient behavioral health care, with the “intervention group” seeing primary care providers that used NeuroFlow’s care navigation platform to improve referral pathways and the rest seeing PCPs without it. Patients at the PCPs using NeuroFlow were 68% more likely to receive outpatient behavioral health services, 43% less likely to have a behavioral health-related inpatient admission, and 33% less likely to visit the ED.

• Innovaccer in the Cross Hairs: Massachusetts-based Fallon Community Health Plan just served Innovaccer, and the lawsuit is a spicy read. Fallon is primarily alleging that Innovaccer’s risk adjustment tech failed to improve the revenue that it gets from coding members (among other let downs), although it used plenty of strong language to make sure everyone knows they’re unhappy customers. Buyer’s remorse doesn’t necessarily sound illegal, but then again we’re not lawyers. 

• Love Letters Go a Long Way: Healthcare is about relationships, and Abridge just put out a masterclass on how to celebrate those connections and partnerships. Their latest Love Stories campaign flips the script on the usual testimonial page and puts the spotlight on the partners themselves, complete with a video that shows them reading letters from Abridgers about why they value working together. Whether you call it “love letters from the heart” or “marketing that doesn’t look like marketing,” the vid pulls on the heart strings either way.

• GenAI Uptake at Hospitals: New research in JAMA Network Open looked at an AHA survey from 2024 to gauge the uptake of EHR-integrated generative AI at U.S. hospitals. Of the 2,174 hospitals surveyed, nearly a third were already using an LLM that was integrated with their EHR this time last year, and another 25% said they were planning to deploy one within a year. We’ll have to wait for the follow-up survey to know if they pulled it off, or if the 43% who reported they had no plans to use LLMs changed their mind. 

• Perfect Form for GLP-1s: Form Health introduced a new employer-direct program to give companies with transparent, predictable pricing for GLP-1s. Starting early next year, employers can leverage Form to offer comprehensive obesity care with clear cost visibility, which could help address the 70% of employers who cite cost unpredictability as a barrier to GLP-1 coverage. To add value beyond cost management, the program also offers integrated clinical support and streamlined benefits administration.

• Tebra + Dr. First: Tebra announced the launch of a new medication adherence program powered by DrFirst. The program uses RxInform, DrFirst’s flagship prescription notification solution, integrated into Tebra’s EHR+ platform. integrated into the Tebra EHR+ platform. Should make it pretty easy for independent practices using Tebra to help out their patients’ medication regimens.

• Auxira Lands Early Funds: Auxira Health raised $7.8M in seed funding to expand its virtual cardiology care model that aims to address capacity shortages nationwide. As part of its platform, Auxira embeds virtual clinical teams consisting of advanced practice providers, medical assistants, and nurses into existing cardiology practices after in-person training. Early study results suggest the model leads to shorter wait times, better patient satisfaction, and less workload for staff physicians.

• Investors Get Creative: After a rollercoaster of uncertainty and tariffs earlier this year, health tech investors have started getting creative with their exits. A solid piece in Endpoints highlighted some of the alternative paths to an ROI that have been gaining popularity. One was offering partial stakes to another company that’s interested in acquiring them – as opposed to an outright acquisition – and another was to have a PE firm set up a new investment vehicle, move the startup into it, then let other investors choose whether they want to stay or punch their ticket.

10 Bold Predictions for Healthcare AI in 2026

If 2024 was the year of proof-of-concept and 2025 was the year of early adoption and scale, 2026 is shaping up to be something different. In 2026, healthcare AI will become expected infrastructure and simply part of how work gets done. Read these 10 predictions from clinical and executive health system leaders, researchers shaping the next phase of the field, and respected analysts describing how the AI conversation will change in 2026.

Supporting Sustainable GLP-1 Weight Loss With Withings

Leading digital health companies and health systems are supporting safe and sustainable GLP-1 weight loss with Withings Health Solutions. See how care teams are using Withings’ suite of remote patient monitoring solutions to prevent muscle loss, combat plateaus, and drive better outcomes for their patients.

The Resource Wire

• Under the Hood of Navina’s AI: Navina’s AI engine harnesses over 600 proprietary algorithms to transform fragmented patient data into actionable clinical intelligence at the point of care. It’s shaped with the expertise of physicians to turn multiple data sources (EHR, HIE, claims, care gap files, etc.) into contextualized insights like suspected conditions or evidence for care gap closures – each linked back to the original source. Download the whitepaper to see examples of Navina’s AI in action.

• Next Generation Ambient Technology and Agents: The ambient AI transformation is already sweeping across health systems, reducing administrative burdens and improving patient outcomes. So, what’s next? Tune into this on-demand session to learn how systems like Carle Health and Denver Health are leveraging Nabla to eliminate Pajama Time and build a future where agentic AI unlocks true workforce sustainability.

The Industry Wire

1. GOP defectors force vote on extending ACA subsidies.
2. Measles outbreaks worsen across the U.S. 
3. CDC adopts controversial change to hepatitis B vaccine policy.
4. FDA to accept de-identified real-world evidence for medical device submissions.
5. American brain drain? Why scientists are leaving the U.S.
6. Eli Lilly’s new weight-loss drug could be agonist triple-threat.
7. Optum and Humana duke it out over MA plan in Washington state.
8. New York to invest $300M in health IT, cybersecurity. 
9. Health systems see potential of gen AI for revenue management.
10. Dana-Farber to fork over $15M to settle charges of publishing fraud.