Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

localnewsmatters.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 401 posts

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#31

Post by throwaway13337 »

What these complaints always boil down to is autonomy and control. The more centralized an organization, the more it relies on metrics to understand and exert control over its employees and customers.

People started hating tech right around the time metrics became popular. I don't think it's a coincidence. AI just accelerates the trend.

The problem is the misidentification of AI as the issue. As long as we don't understand the real issue, we won't solve it. AI is just a tool. It's being used in a way that denies human agency.

Our cultural values need to shift away from safetism that demands centralization. And shift toward valuing human agency. That starts with talking about the core issue.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#32

Post by lostlogin »

malfist wrote: post #15
BeetleB wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you employ a few hundred nurses, how exactly would you evaluate how well they show empathy? You can't rely on asking the customer. When they're upset (they often are in these calls), they'll lean towards the negative regardless. I don't know how well these AIs evaluate, but if they're even a little bit good, it makes sense to use it to screen for outliers, then have a human listen to those outliers and judge.

Actually, you can rely on the customers. They're the only ones that can tell you.

> you can rely on the customers.

Patient or customer? I even struggle with that, but I guess that’s what people are in a privatised healthcare system.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#33

Post by nojito »

bmitc wrote: post #22
nojito wrote: post #13

Kaiser has some of the best healthcare outcomes in the country/world due to their protocols and how good they are in ensuring adherence to them. It’s going to be very improbable that these statements are true.

> Kaiser has some of the best healthcare outcomes in the country/world due to their protocols and how good they are in ensuring adherence to them. Where and how is that determined? I.e., any references to back that up? And you can't in one breath say they have the best healthcare but then say their employees' reports of their experience are unreliable.

Not sure if you’re serious but just search the name Kaiser in any research search engine.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8032167/

Their secret sauce is their ability to standardize protocols throughout their entire organization.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#34

Post by apercu »

BeetleB wrote: post #14
14 wrote: post #6

I would love to learn the cost of the AI versus how many new workers they could afford to hire and get more calls done. But I assume the end goal will be full replacement of human workers once the AI has had enough time to learn the job.

The AI is a lot cheaper. Kaiser nurses are amongst the highest paid in the nation.

Subsidized Gen AI maybe.

Also, California has a high cost of living.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#35

Post by munk-a »

BeetleB wrote: post #8
munk-a wrote: post #5

> "Nurses fear that having long calls can lead to bad performance reviews" > A company spokesperson said, "Kaiser Permanente does not use Average Handle Time to assess agent performance" So uh, average time wasn't raised as a concern, calls beyond a certain threshold was. I wish this semantic discrepancy was better highlighted in the article.

I have some inside information (but not much!) They claim they do not use average handle time, but it is very common to get called into meetings to discuss why they spent a lot of time on some calls. The nurses get defensive (by definition - they have to justify the time used - it is a defense). They also do get called into meetings if their average handle time is large. It may still be true they don't use it for eva…

Yeah, I didn't even want to lean out that far but I'm sure average handle time is incorporated in some manner.

But, just purely semantically, the statement Kaiser gave in response was worded in a precise smug corporate America style to dodge the main concern raised. I think it's important to call out weasel words.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#36

Post by kulahan »

bmitc wrote: post #22
nojito wrote: post #13

Kaiser has some of the best healthcare outcomes in the country/world due to their protocols and how good they are in ensuring adherence to them. It’s going to be very improbable that these statements are true.

> Kaiser has some of the best healthcare outcomes in the country/world due to their protocols and how good they are in ensuring adherence to them. Where and how is that determined? I.e., any references to back that up? And you can't in one breath say they have the best healthcare but then say their employees' reports of their experience are unreliable.

The care quality of all major healthcare providers in the US is some pretty available data, and I've never heard anyone of being suspicious of Kaiser, of all companies. They're specifically known for having really good outcomes. It's like asking for a source that McDonald's sells the most burgers in America. It might not be true - maybe technically it's someone selling sliders or whatever, but it's so close it's probably not worth arguing over anyways.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#39

Post by lostlogin »

nojito wrote: post #33
bmitc wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Kaiser has some of the best healthcare outcomes in the country/world due to their protocols and how good they are in ensuring adherence to them. Where and how is that determined? I.e., any references to back that up? And you can't in one breath say they have the best healthcare but then say their employees' reports of their experience are unreliable.

Not sure if you’re serious but just search the name Kaiser in any research search engine. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8032167/ Their secret sauce is their ability to standardize protocols throughout their entire organization.

That’s the measure for one pathology, but in terms of a provider comparison, what’s the measure? It isn’t dollars versus life span or morbidity.

Re: Kaiser nurses say AI, surveillance are making their jobs and patient care worse

#40

Post by optimiz3 »

thin_carapace wrote: post #28
inigyou wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Power is based on wealth extraction, not merit.

isn't that exactly what a class terrified of the guillotine would want underclasses to believe?

In the future that class will control the guillotines in the form of Boston Dynamics guard dogs.
Post reply on HN