Lee Schwamm, MD

AI Scribes Help Reduce Burnout, With Lee Schwamm, MD

Many clinicians are turning to artificial intelligence (AI)–powered documentation assistants to reduce

 and improve efficiency, yet not all physicians are immediately convinced. Many are comfortable with long-established electronic health record (EHR) workflows or prefer to maintain full control over documentation.

According to Lee Schwamm, MD, chief digital health officer at Yale New Haven Health System, such hesitation is understandable but may be short-lived once clinicians see the impact these tools can have on both workflow and patient engagement.

“The technology is not for everyone,” Schwamm said. “There are some providers who are extremely facile with the electronic health record [and] have structured their notes. They use lots of drop-down lists or checklists. They've really optimized their use of the electronic health record, or they don't see that many patients in a given week, or the encounter itself is really focused on the exam and not as much on the conversational parts. So, for those physicians, it might not be the right choice, but I think for a skeptical physician, the first thing to do is to get them to talk to their peers who are using it and have found it useful.”

AI scribes, such as those powered by platforms like Abridge, use natural language processing to record the clinician–patient conversation and automatically generate structured notes for clinician review. A new multicenter study showed this tool reduced physician burnout from 51.9% to 38.8% after 1 month of use (

To make the most of the tool, some physicians may need to subtly adjust their communication style. The notes capture what’s said aloud, meaning that clinicians who tend to write thoughts silently after the visit may need to verbalize more of their reasoning in real time.

Schwamm noted this shift reflects a broader evolution in the patient–physician dynamic. In the past, medical notes served primarily as a record for colleagues or billing, not as a communication tool for patients. But as patient access to records has increased, transparency during visits—explaining diagnoses, treatment options, and care plans aloud—has become integral to trust and engagement.

Earlier AI documentation tools were largely limited to transcription, but newer iterations extract structured clinical data and can integrate directly with the EHR. Schwamm said this capability opens new opportunities for real-time clinical support, from generating differential diagnoses to preparing medication orders and coding recommendations.

Concerns about safety and accuracy remain central to conversations about AI, but Schwamm emphasized that AI scribes operate with a “human-in-the-loop” model, or augmented intelligence, where physicians maintain complete oversight of the generated note before it becomes part of the record. Transparency tools, such as the ability to trace each phrase to the original transcript or audio, further reinforce trust and accountability.

At Yale, Schwamm and colleagues are exploring how AI scribes can enhance medical education, allowing students to learn note-taking fundamentals while integrating digital tools into their workflow. He said the team is testing hybrid approaches in which trainees write their own notes, then review AI-generated versions to combine accuracy with efficiency.

“We have to be really focused on [trainees writing their own notes] so we don't lose important skills,” Schwamm said. “The other thing is that we should really be trying to segregate the things that human brains do really well, like reasoning, from the things that AI does really well, like recognizing and matching patterns, and so AI should be the best possible assistant that your doctor could have, whispering in their ear all the time about what might be happening or what they should consider or how they might choose between several options, but fundamentally respecting the ability of the physician to engage with patients, draw out from the patients the important information, and translate that information into medical terminology to enable them to make the right diagnosis.”

A relevant disclosure for Schwamm includes serving as a volunteer member of a research advisory committee for Abridge to facilitate the use of ambient data for clinical researchers.

Olson KD, Meeker D, Troup M, et al. Use of Ambient AI Scribes to Reduce Administrative Burden and Professional Burnout. 

Schwamm L. AI Scribes Reduce Physician Burnout Within 30 Days, With Lee Schwamm, MD. HCPLive. October 27, 2025. 

https://www.hcplive.com/view/ai-scribes-reduce-physician-burnout-within-30-days-lee-schwamm-md

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Lee Schwamm, MD, discusses how AI-powered documentation tools are reshaping notetaking, patient engagement, and medical training.

AI Scribes Reduce Physician Burnout Within 30 Days, With Lee Schwamm, MD

A new multicenter study highlights the significant potential of artificial intelligence (AI)–powered ambient clinical documentation tools, also known as AI scribes, in reducing burnout among clinicians burdened by administrative tasks.

The study, conducted across 6 academic and community-based health systems in the United States between February 1 and October 31, 2024, evaluated the impact of an ambient AI scribe platform called Abridge on self-reported physician burnout and related outcomes. A total of 263 ambulatory care physicians completed surveys before and after 30 days of using the tool. In total, the study included 131 primary care practitioners (49.7%), 232 attending physicians, and 168 academic faculty (63.9%).

Clinician burnout, driven by rising administrative demands, electronic health record (EHR) documentation, and working after-hours or “pajama time,” remains a pressing challenge in medicine, exacerbated by clinician shortages and an aging, chronically ill population.

“Over the last…10 years, the administrative burden of practicing medicine has increased exponentially,” investigator Lee Schwamm, MD, from Yale New Haven Health System, told 

Back when Schwamm did his training, it was all handwritten paper charts and films projected on the whiteboard to look at radiology images. Notes tended to be relatively short and did not capture the full picture of care. With the arrival of modern electronic health records, this transactional system was centralized.

“What that means is that many things [that a] physician did not use to do themselves but would delegate to others are now on the task list of the physician,” Schwamm explained. “[Now most of the] visit is spent with the physician [using] their hands on the keyboard and looking at the screen, as opposed to looking at the patient. It’s an urgent issue, and many providers describe burnout and this administrative burden in particular as a reason to think about leaving the field of medicine altogether.”

AI scribes aim to reverse this shift by automatically listening to clinician–patient conversations, extracting key details, and generating structured medical notes for clinician review. According to Schwamm, earlier versions of these tools offered limited utility, but there have been “dramatic improvements” in documentation accuracy and usability in recent large language models.

Investigators noted that the results were striking: the proportion of physicians reporting burnout (standard cutoff of ≥ 3) dropped from 51.9% to 38.8% after just one month of use (difference, 13.1 percentage points), a substantial reduction rarely seen in interventions targeting burnout (odds ratio [OR], 0.26; 95% CI, 0.13 - 0.54; 

 <.001). A post-hoc severity analysis including physicians with severe burnout (cutoff ≥ 4) showed a significant drop in severe burnout from 18.4% to 12.2% (difference, 6.2 percentage points; 

Secondary measures also improved significantly, including reduced documentation task load (mean difference, 2.64 points; 

<.001), greater ability to focus on patients (mean difference, 2.64 points;

 <.001), improved perceived clarity of notes for patients (mean difference, -0.44 points; 

 =.005), less time spent documenting after hours (mean difference, 0.90 hours; 

 <.001), and increased flexibility to accommodate urgent patients (mean difference, 0.51 points; 

Clinician burnout if becoming more and more recognized. At the 2025 SDPA Annual Summer Dermatology Conference, 

 spoke with Hope Cook, PA-C, a physician associate from Georgia Skin Cancer & Aesthetic Dermatology and author of the new book, 

Healing Clinician Burnout: How to Revive Your Life and Career.

During her talk, she introduced the “CRP” framework to combat clinician burnout realistically.

“I just want to emphasize there's so many things that we try to do to reduce burnout, and most of them don't work,” Schwamm said.

“The fact that in 30 days this intervention had a dramatic impact on the reduction of burnout is really wonderful. It's a really positive message, and I think it's one that will make this application almost table stakes for healthcare systems in the future.”

 2025;8(10):e2534976. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.34976

Cook H. Discussing Ways to Help Clinicians Facing Career Burnout, with Hope Cook, PA-C. Hcplive.com. Published June 27, 2025. Accessed October 27, 2025. https://www.hcplive.com/view/discussing-ways-help-clinicians-facing-career-burnout-hope-cook-pa-c

Physicians experience significant challenges with increasing administrative burdens impacting patient care. Study shows AI scribes can help reduce burnout.

Lee Schwamm, MD

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