Florida Blue and Olive Debut First-Of-Its-Kind AI Solution to Accelerate Access to Health Care

Florida Blue, the Blue Cross and Blue Shield plan of Florida, and Olive, the automation company creating the Internet of Healthcare, today announced an innovative collaboration of healthcare and technology. With Olive’s technology, Florida Blue becomes the first U.S. payer to automate the prior authorization approval through AI-powered clinical reviews, resulting in faster care for its members and greater provider satisfaction. This partnership will transform a frustrating, labor-intensive process, accelerating Florida Blue’s vision to be a leading innovator to enable healthy communities. 

"Olive’s AI platform helps Florida Blue create a best-in-class utilization management model that reduces the administrative burden on our providers while creating a better experience for our members," said Dr. Elana Schrader, Florida Blue senior vice president, healthcare services and GuideWell Health president. "By being the first health plan to automate approvals, we are leading the way for insurers to close the technology gap to better serve our members and providers.”

For most of the industry, the prior authorization process is a time-consuming endeavor for both providers and payers, requiring phone calls and faxes to provide patient medical records. Incomplete and inconsistent data can cause delays and lead to a 15-day cycle before a member receives authorization for a procedure. Florida Blue receives hundreds of thousands of prior authorization submissions each year.

By deploying Olive’s AI platform, the prior authorization decision-making moves to the point of care (such as a doctor’s office). The solution will enable members to receive authorizations faster by giving providers an immediate approval from Florida Blue (sometimes before a member leaves their provider’s office) when Olive’s artificial intelligence determines the prior authorization request meets Florida Blue’s medical necessity requirements.

This increase in decision-making at the point of care provides members with the right care, at the right place, at the right time.  As a result, clinical staff spend less time on administrative functions and more time on patient care. Olive refers to this process — connecting the industry’s systems to deliver intelligence more rapidly, resulting in better human outcomes — as creating the Internet of Healthcare. 
Florida Blue launched a pilot with Olive last year and saw impressive results: a massive reduction in time to decision by 10 days when immediate responses were available and a 27 percent decrease in unnecessary prior authorization requests, lessening the provider's burden and operational costs and 48 percent faster decisions leading to faster patient care.

“Olive is proud to partner with Florida Blue, the first payer to use automation and AI to automatically prepare, submit and deliver payer-approved prior authorizations — one of the most broken processes in health care today,” said Jeremy Friese, MD, president, payer market at Olive. “Together, we are reimagining the care experience for patients, payers and providers.” 

The companies will begin rolling out the AI platform in April, with a full-scale implementation in July for more than 2.5 million commercial members.

About Florida Blue

Florida Blue, Florida’s Blue Cross and Blue Shield company, has been providing health insurance to residents of Florida for more than 75 years. Driven by its mission of helping people and communities achieve better health, the company serves more than 5 million health care members across the state. Headquartered in Jacksonville, Fla., it is an independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.

About Olive
Olive is the automation company creating the Internet of Healthcare. The company is addressing healthcare's most burdensome issues through automation — delivering hospitals, health systems and payers increased revenue, reduced costs, and increased capacity. People feel lost in the system today and healthcare employees are essentially working in the dark due to outdated technology that creates a lack of shared knowledge and siloed data. Olive is driving connections to shine new light on healthcare processes, improving operations today so everyone can benefit from a healthier industry tomorrow. To learn more about Olive, visit oliveai.com.