Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / How CVS Health Is Using Agentic AI Twins to Transform Patient Experience
Transcript
- 0:00Everyone. This is Jacob Emerson with the Becker's
- 0:02Health IT podcast.
- 0:04Thrilled today to be joined by CVS Health's
- 0:06vice president of enterprise customer experience and insights.
- 0:10Sri, thank you so much for taking the
- 0:12time to be with me on the podcast
- 0:13today. Pat, thanks, Jacob. Appreciate the time. Excited
- 0:16to be here with you. Likewise. And before
- 0:18we dive into everything we wanna talk with
- 0:20you about, some interesting new tech that CVS
- 0:22has been rolling out, can you first tell
- 0:24our audience a little bit more about yourself,
- 0:26your background in health care, and a little
- 0:28bit about your role at CVS today?
- 0:31Yeah. So,
- 0:32as you mentioned, I lead, customer experience and
- 0:35insights for CVS Health. I I started my
- 0:37career actually as an economist.
- 0:39So,
- 0:40looking more at, you know, markets and evaluating
- 0:43them for competitive dynamics and
- 0:46defending mergers and and acquisitions to department of
- 0:49justice.
- 0:50And, you know, that's where I kinda first
- 0:51got exposed to health care. I used to
- 0:53look at things like hospital mergers and and,
- 0:55you know, medical device mergers, and I got
- 0:57really fascinated by health care. And then my
- 1:00career kinda took a a bit of a
- 1:01winding path. I worked at, you know, GE,
- 1:04including GE Healthcare,
- 1:06Did spend some time at Wells Fargo,
- 1:08you know, in the banking industry, so got
- 1:10a little bit more exposure to the to
- 1:11the regulated banking industry
- 1:13before joining here, at CVS Health. And my
- 1:16role at CVS Health
- 1:18is I look at all of the consumer
- 1:20feedback we get, whether that's through surveys
- 1:24or,
- 1:25social media data, digital session data,
- 1:28call transcripts, whatever we can get our hands
- 1:30on
- 1:31to understand,
- 1:32what are some of the patient client, you
- 1:35know, member pain points that we have across
- 1:38our entire enterprise, so retail at
- 1:41health care delivery, Caremark.
- 1:43And how do we improve the experiences for
- 1:45those stakeholders and make sure that we're delivering
- 1:48best in class experiences
- 1:50so that those people can get the health
- 1:51care they need.
- 1:53When I when I kinda give my team
- 1:54a tagline, I say our job is to
- 1:56learn from the past, improve the present, and
- 1:58predict the future,
- 1:59particularly with respect for our members who we
- 2:02serve as the internal advocate for
- 2:04across all of our our internal teams, whether
- 2:07that's in technology or the business or elsewhere.
- 2:10Understood. So your background is more in the
- 2:12business and finance sector. Now you're here at
- 2:15CVS,
- 2:17modeling what patients and and customers
- 2:19are doing. And and you're here with us
- 2:21today, Shree, to talk a little bit about,
- 2:24something really interesting that we I I haven't
- 2:26necessarily heard a lot from other health care
- 2:28organizations, at least publicly.
- 2:31CVS, since late last year, has been rolling
- 2:33out Agentic AI twin simulations.
- 2:37So talk to our audience about what that
- 2:39is. When you talk about
- 2:41agentic twins,
- 2:43what does that actually mean, and and what
- 2:44does that actually look like in practice
- 2:46for CVS specifically?
- 2:48Yeah. And I bet on this podcast, you
- 2:50talked to a lot of leaders who talk
- 2:51about being consumer centric. Right? And I think
- 2:53that's something that
- 2:55everyone says. You probably see it in every
- 2:57single 10 k
- 2:58out there, every CEO,
- 3:00dialogue. I I think what's hard is being
- 3:03consumer centric is really difficult. Getting the voice
- 3:05of that customer into all of the aspects
- 3:08of what you do
- 3:09is challenging because it's hard to get to
- 3:11customers. It's hard to talk to them. It's
- 3:12hard for you to test things with them
- 3:15or and learn from them.
- 3:17You're limited in terms of how you can
- 3:18outreach these folks. You know, you can leverage
- 3:20surveys or maybe the scale.
- 3:22You know, you have to do pilots.
- 3:24And
- 3:25it's being consumer centric is challenging. You have
- 3:28that challenge simultaneously
- 3:30with
- 3:31the advent of AI and all the advancements
- 3:33you're having in AI.
- 3:35And what we realized in in working with
- 3:38these, you know, company from Stanford founded by
- 3:41a bunch of PhDs and computer science from
- 3:43Stanford
- 3:44is that we can actually build
- 3:47agentic twins of our customers or or patients
- 3:50or clients
- 3:51where we can actually
- 3:52build the way they make decisions.
- 3:55So not just what they did in the
- 3:56past, but how do they actually make decisions?
- 3:58How do they actually,
- 4:00handle trade offs? What are the behaviors that
- 4:03they they would exhibit in a given situation?
- 4:06And then we can generalize that to new
- 4:09scenarios and new situations. So if you do
- 4:12that at scale, and in our case, something
- 4:14like a 100,000
- 4:16plus
- 4:17Agenctic Twins,
- 4:19you will have a set of customers with
- 4:21you all the time
- 4:22that are, you know, effectively amplifying the consumer
- 4:25voice.
- 4:26So they are with you from when you
- 4:28develop the product, when you wanna test the
- 4:31outcome, if you wanna test some operational change.
- 4:34And they it creates that real consumer centricity
- 4:38because
- 4:39that representation of the consumer, how they think,
- 4:41how they behave is with you throughout the
- 4:43entire process.
- 4:45So, you know, it's the way we've gone
- 4:47about doing that is we ingest a lot
- 4:49of different information. Of course, all consumer consented,
- 4:53but we take things like a a short
- 4:55behavioral interview, behavioral signals,
- 4:58spend data, things like that where we can
- 5:00build a twin
- 5:02of each individual consumer. And, again, you do
- 5:04that at scale
- 5:06where you actually have their thought process with
- 5:08you, and this agentic twin of the customer
- 5:12lives on and is always on,
- 5:15for you to investigate and challenge new concepts,
- 5:18new ideas, and to actually even perform dress
- 5:20rehearsals of new things you're trying to launch
- 5:22out. And it's really helped our decision making
- 5:26our understanding of the consumer throughout the whole
- 5:28product life cycle,
- 5:30and and really just it's brought them to
- 5:31life in a way that I don't think
- 5:33was possible in the past.
- 5:35And now, we really we really do. It's
- 5:37kinda putting your money where your mouth is
- 5:39in terms of centricity.
- 5:40You're having these customers with you across the
- 5:42entire journey.
- 5:44Wow. I mean, this is fascinating. You you
- 5:46literally copy and pasted
- 5:48your customer base, and and now you can
- 5:50see how they interact with all your different
- 5:52businesses.
- 5:54So
- 5:56back backing up here, Sri, why did CVS
- 5:58wanna go down this route? How why do
- 6:00you wanna leverage this kind of technology?
- 6:02And what does it actually do problem wise
- 6:05for your patients and for your customers?
- 6:08How does it solve issues for them on
- 6:10the ground?
- 6:11Yeah. So I think the reason you would
- 6:13wanna we wanted to undertake this is we
- 6:15really do take consumer centricity seriously. I mean,
- 6:18we wanna build products and services
- 6:20that help people access health care in an
- 6:23effective way
- 6:25and really solve the big challenges with The
- 6:27US health care system around, you know, simplicity,
- 6:30you know, ease of access, all those things
- 6:32that you hear about constantly from from patients.
- 6:35And I think where we we're we're landing
- 6:37is we have the ability to get to
- 6:39these folks via traditional methods, whether that's panel
- 6:42research or surveys
- 6:43or even to a degree looking at operational
- 6:45data. But each one of those things had
- 6:48challenges. Right? Either it was
- 6:50speed, you know, or fidelity or any of
- 6:52those things that
- 6:54that challenge you in terms of getting to
- 6:56that group. So when we heard about this
- 6:57methodology and this approach, it was really exciting
- 7:00because
- 7:01it would it would really unlock what we've
- 7:03been trying to do, which is get the
- 7:05patient
- 7:06front and center on the way we build
- 7:08things. And I think if you if you
- 7:10look at what we've seen so far, the
- 7:12four main things we've gotten out of these
- 7:14twins,
- 7:15just in terms of the value of how
- 7:17we build, is one speed.
- 7:19You go from weeks to months to generate
- 7:22insights. So if you have to go get
- 7:23a panel and test something, whether that's messaging
- 7:26or some product or service,
- 7:28it takes time. You gotta go find those
- 7:30patients. You have to go interview them. You
- 7:32know, you have to you have to distill
- 7:34those insights.
- 7:35Now we're talking about fifteen to thirty minutes.
- 7:38And, you know, I'll tell you honestly, Jacob,
- 7:39the first handful of times we did this,
- 7:41I was stunned. Like, things that would take
- 7:42us eight weeks, we were doing in fifteen
- 7:45to twenty minutes.
- 7:47The second is fidelity.
- 7:49You know, you you can only test so
- 7:51many things with a human being. Right? There's
- 7:53only so many
- 7:54scenarios you can put in front of them
- 7:55before their brain sort of breaks. They'll get
- 7:58fatigue. You know, the signal quality reduces.
- 8:01They're not able to answer. With these AI
- 8:03representations,
- 8:04you can test thousands of real world scenarios,
- 8:07and you're not extrapolating out what they're gonna
- 8:09what they're gonna do in a given situation.
- 8:12You can present them with tons and thousands
- 8:14of different scenarios or situations
- 8:16and see how they'll actually behave. And that
- 8:19actually also solves a big problem in research
- 8:21where you have what's called stated intent.
- 8:23So what someone tells you and what they'll
- 8:25actually do. And here with this scenario testing,
- 8:28just because you've generalized how someone makes a
- 8:30decision or how they think,
- 8:32you can actually get to the actual behavior
- 8:35and even understand that gap between stated intent
- 8:38and actual behavior.
- 8:39The scale here, you have all these folks
- 8:41on
- 8:42all the time, so you don't have to
- 8:43generalize the small pilots.
- 8:45You know, you have thousands,
- 8:47tens of thousands, and so some cases for
- 8:49the populations we looked at, agentic twins available
- 8:52to us at all times. So that scale
- 8:54of the consumer voice is is tremendous
- 8:57and now available to us to access,
- 8:59you know, as we go forward. And then
- 9:01the final component is the reach. Like, these
- 9:04hard to reach populations
- 9:06that we often have,
- 9:07you know, whether that's particular disease states or
- 9:10conditions where it's just difficult to find those
- 9:13people or that can be really costly.
- 9:15Now we only have to really find them
- 9:17once because then we can create this twin
- 9:19of that person, and then they'll be with
- 9:21us the whole time. And it goes back
- 9:22to, I think,
- 9:24amplifying that consumer voice with that hard to
- 9:26reach population particularly because
- 9:28that's a group that's, you know, often
- 9:31marginalized because we can't get to that group,
- 9:34to understand what they're experiencing.
- 9:35So if you if you wrap all that
- 9:37up, we're getting away from reacting
- 9:40to small groups
- 9:42and with long timelines to get their feedback,
- 9:45to predicting behavior, acting almost in near real
- 9:48time, and having these consumers with us along
- 9:52the entire journey,
- 9:53it's transformative. It's it's changing the way we
- 9:56deliver care because we're able to understand
- 9:59what's gonna actually impact our consumers in a
- 10:01real way while we're building these products
- 10:05and not having to do things like, you
- 10:07know, really narrow pilots and constant testing.
- 10:10We can go out with a lot more
- 10:11confidence in what we're doing
- 10:13because we've been able to dress, rehearse it
- 10:15with, you know, tens of thousands of customers
- 10:17before we actually hit the market, and and
- 10:18anyone has to actually experience what we're building.
- 10:22Absolutely. I mean, listening to you talk about
- 10:24this is incredible. It it it sounds transformative.
- 10:27I I I've done marketing initiatives myself in
- 10:30terms of doing those panels like you said
- 10:32that take eight weeks and boiling that down
- 10:35to fifteen minutes is that's incredible.
- 10:38Not to mention what to hook on the
- 10:40last part of your answer, the
- 10:42the equity of it all of being able
- 10:43to reach your entire customer base and know
- 10:46how they all respond,
- 10:48and not having to put everybody into pockets.
- 10:50It's it's amazing. I I can't imagine what's
- 10:52gonna be coming from this. And so I
- 10:54think that's that's the natural follow-up question here,
- 10:56Sri, is how does this change the way
- 10:58that CVS
- 11:00makes decisions compared to those traditional approaches you
- 11:03just laid out for us even just from
- 11:05a marketing perspective. But maybe you could expand
- 11:07a bit on in terms of clinical decisions,
- 11:10other areas of the pharmacist of the of
- 11:13the industry that the company reaches.
- 11:16How does this change the day to day
- 11:18for CVS and and the business overall?
- 11:20Yeah. And I I can give you a
- 11:21couple of just concrete examples of that we've
- 11:24that we've tried so far, that we've seen
- 11:26success with. I think one, you know, one
- 11:28classic one for us in the pharmacy side
- 11:30is adherence.
- 11:32That's an area we we've got a tremendous
- 11:34amount of focus. Obviously, we want people to
- 11:36be adherent to their medication. We want them
- 11:38to stay healthy.
- 11:39Accessing medications
- 11:41is really important to
- 11:42us. That can be a a difficult group
- 11:44to talk to, particularly nonadherent patients. There's a
- 11:47lot of reasons people don't, you know, adhere
- 11:49to medication. Some of them related to stigma,
- 11:52fear.
- 11:53And you're in a sense, if you're going
- 11:55to talk to that group,
- 11:56you're making them relive whatever that was the
- 11:59challenge that they had. And that can be
- 12:01really difficult that you it can lead to
- 12:04false signals. It can lead to, you know,
- 12:06different types of challenges in terms of getting
- 12:08to the population,
- 12:10fatigue, lack of sample, those sorts of things
- 12:12because they're just a difficult group to reach.
- 12:15What we were able to do with the
- 12:16twins is we were able to actually go
- 12:18through and and investigate in detail adherence issues.
- 12:22So get because you don't have to face
- 12:24that and it's you know, you don't have
- 12:26that same sort of challenge
- 12:28with the Gentic twins because they're AI representations,
- 12:31we were able to get way deeper than
- 12:33I think we could have in a standard
- 12:35qualitative or even quantitative interview.
- 12:37What we're we were able to figure out
- 12:39is a lot of the things about adherence
- 12:41were the same that you would expect that
- 12:42we've always seen.
- 12:44You know, it's,
- 12:45you know, fear of side effects and fear
- 12:48of, you know, you know, not being able
- 12:50to talk to a clinician and all those
- 12:51things that we've been solving,
- 12:53over the, you know, course of the past
- 12:55few years.
- 12:56But a new one's emerged, and it was
- 12:58really around
- 12:59the fear of getting a refill, which sounds
- 13:02really you know, it sounds a little bit
- 13:04strange. It wasn't what we expected, but we
- 13:06were able to see, like, you know, a
- 13:08lot of what we were observing was people
- 13:10were saying, okay. Now once I start a
- 13:12medication, how do I make sure I'm always
- 13:13gonna get it? What happens if I can't
- 13:15get that medication?
- 13:17You know, does that is that gonna have
- 13:18outcomes for me? And all those things that
- 13:20we were able to see that that were
- 13:22clear in the data.
- 13:23And I think what what it pointed to
- 13:25is that we have a lot of best
- 13:26in class digital tools we're building and can
- 13:28have built
- 13:30that are making accessing medications
- 13:32much easier. So it gave us a lot
- 13:34more confidence
- 13:35in those tools we're building. And in addition,
- 13:37we're able to actually look at how do
- 13:39we optimize some of those tools to ensure
- 13:41that,
- 13:42you know, we're we are making it as
- 13:44easy as possible on the refill.
- 13:46And I I think what it really pointed
- 13:48out is
- 13:49this anxiety, and it's patient anxiety that you
- 13:52were able
- 13:53that you were able to see in in
- 13:54the agentic twins around all the process related
- 13:57to the prescription. So it wasn't just the
- 13:59medication.
- 14:01It was the process
- 14:02and the experience
- 14:03that led to adherence. And, you know, we
- 14:05were able to back that up with a
- 14:06lot of the actual data we were able
- 14:08to we were collecting from the customers.
- 14:11When I say actual, I mean, operational data
- 14:13that we were collecting from the customers.
- 14:16It it it was a it's a it
- 14:17was a way for us to unlock something
- 14:19that we didn't we didn't see in the
- 14:21past.
- 14:22And I think what's particularly unique about it
- 14:24is we're talking about effectively about robots here,
- 14:26Jacob. We build robots that represent customers,
- 14:30but they were unlocking
- 14:31something that's as that's superhuman
- 14:34and anxiety.
- 14:35And so we were able to get to
- 14:37the emotion through these agentic twins, which I
- 14:39think is a really fascinating
- 14:42use case for us.
- 14:44And then just a a quick related one
- 14:45just because you mentioned marketing. Another one was
- 14:48related to our PetRx.
- 14:50I'm gonna just tell a story really quickly.
- 14:52You know, PetRx is our our you know,
- 14:54we're looking to to move into pet care,
- 14:56and we're looking at how do we message
- 14:58to those to those, pet parents, if you
- 15:00will. I'm a pet parent. I've got a
- 15:01dog.
- 15:02And, you know, there was a lot of
- 15:04the data we were expecting, like emotional data
- 15:06that people care a lot about their pets.
- 15:08They become, like, family members.
- 15:10One of the more interesting things we saw
- 15:12from the Agenctic twins was
- 15:14people were saying, you know, that even giving
- 15:16medication to a pet was an act of
- 15:18devotion, not necessarily a chore.
- 15:21So any messaging appealing to the emotions was
- 15:23gonna be successful.
- 15:24But what the the agentic twins allowed us
- 15:26to do is present scenarios
- 15:28beyond that. And what we found was it
- 15:30wasn't enough
- 15:32to just be
- 15:34connecting emotionally. You had to show that we
- 15:36had the capability to actually get the the
- 15:39scripts from the veterinarians,
- 15:41have an understanding what those scripts are, how
- 15:44the side effects work. That was really important
- 15:46to the pet parents. So
- 15:48by being able to drill in and get
- 15:50to the kind of stated versus actual actual
- 15:52behavior using the twins, we were able to
- 15:54uncover
- 15:56that the messaging needed to have both. It
- 15:58wasn't sufficient to just have messaging and marketing
- 16:00that was appealing to emotion. We had to
- 16:02appeal to the tactical side too, because pet
- 16:05owners are incredibly pragmatic despite this emotional connection
- 16:09that I think we all observe and see.
- 16:11So, anyway, those are two kinda quick examples
- 16:13of where we've we've seen early wins.
- 16:16And, you know, we're operating this at scale,
- 16:18so there's more to come, I think, here
- 16:20as we keep moving forward.
- 16:22Oh, absolutely. I I can imagine so. And
- 16:24for pretty much any company listening in right
- 16:26now, I would imagine they are taking notes
- 16:28on how to replicate something like this, Sri,
- 16:31because the the possibilities seem endless just listening
- 16:34to even those those two examples you shared,
- 16:36and I really like how you framed it
- 16:38of unlocking something that is human. You're you're
- 16:42unlocking something that the humans on the other
- 16:44side maybe hadn't been able to before, which
- 16:46is really fascinating.
- 16:48It's a really unique AI use case. You
- 16:50know? It's not it's in a sense, it's,
- 16:53it's not one of the ones that I
- 16:54think are traditional,
- 16:56and it's it's using AI to understand human
- 16:58behavior,
- 16:59which, again, sounds a little counterintuitive.
- 17:01But I think No. It makes sense. Yeah.
- 17:03Yeah. It's really creating this always on approach
- 17:06with our customers. Definitely. Definitely. Is there anything
- 17:09you'd add for for the health care audience
- 17:11that's listening in terms of the value prop
- 17:14here for the wider health care system?
- 17:17Yeah. I think, you know, if you if
- 17:20I were thinking about more broadly,
- 17:22a EO, even things like patient experience
- 17:24and and I'll use the experience tag because
- 17:26that's that's where I, you know, tend to
- 17:28focus.
- 17:29It it's
- 17:31ability to test messaging. Like, how do we
- 17:34change in particular in health care is really
- 17:36painful. That's observed everywhere.
- 17:38You can see that across multiple populations when
- 17:41you change people's
- 17:42medications, when you change formularies, when you change
- 17:45the way they access care, it's painful.
- 17:48But what this allows you to do is
- 17:49test different messaging and different approaches to see
- 17:52how you how do you smooth that, how
- 17:54do you make that easier on the patient.
- 17:56And you're able to do that here in
- 17:58a controlled, safe environment
- 18:00that you you are able to see the
- 18:02results before you actually have to go into
- 18:04the market and test that. I think that's
- 18:05a really big unlock for health care.
- 18:08The the other one, I think, is understanding
- 18:10journeys. Health care journeys are incredibly complex,
- 18:13and, you know, it's it can be difficult
- 18:15to actually get patient feedback along every aspect
- 18:18of that journey.
- 18:19But here, you can you can do that,
- 18:21and you can see how people are experiencing
- 18:24every aspect of where they engage with you.
- 18:27And I think understanding quickly where you have
- 18:29pain points and where you may need to
- 18:31do some work and may where you're excelling
- 18:33and maybe where you need to double down.
- 18:35Health care in particular to me,
- 18:38this is a way to
- 18:40test and learn
- 18:42quickly,
- 18:43with those audiences.
- 18:45And I think it's it's a major unlock
- 18:48because I I think that's where and I
- 18:49know I keep using the word unlock because
- 18:51I think in in these populations,
- 18:54traditionally, it's really difficult to get the feedback,
- 18:56and they're also really difficult to pilot with.
- 18:59Because if you're running tests, you're actually running
- 19:01tests on someone that's experiencing something,
- 19:04or trying to access care. And that's not
- 19:06always easy, and that's not always right, and
- 19:08it's it can be difficult.
- 19:09Here, you're able to do those tests in
- 19:11this controlled environment without having to worry about
- 19:13the patient risk or outcome. It makes it
- 19:16safer, and it and it makes it more
- 19:17controlled.
- 19:19And I think, you know, the follow on
- 19:21effect is you're gonna deliver better care,
- 19:24for those patients and for those stakeholders.
- 19:26Sure. Let me ask you a a bit
- 19:28of a prodding question.
- 19:30Just as this technology
- 19:32continues to develop, we'll continue to see it
- 19:34across many companies,
- 19:36different industries.
- 19:38How are you thinking about how CVS wants
- 19:41to
- 19:41ensure responsible use
- 19:44of of agentic twins at enterprise scale? You
- 19:46know, you're able to now test an an
- 19:49external pressure
- 19:50on on your customer
- 19:52base. How do you balance,
- 19:55some of the potential negatives of that or
- 19:57or ensure that there's gonna be human judgment,
- 19:59trust,
- 20:00good governance of this technology as it begins
- 20:03to as already has started to influence,
- 20:06real health care on the ground?
- 20:08Yeah. It's a really important question.
- 20:10I I think one, we do. We have
- 20:12very strong controls around this, and there's a
- 20:14couple different ways we do it.
- 20:16We continuously test
- 20:18these twins,
- 20:19against not only our own data,
- 20:22but third party studies
- 20:24to ensure that we have the highest quality
- 20:26information.
- 20:27And, you know, one of the things that
- 20:28we're doing that these twins do as well,
- 20:31is they actually live in the world, so
- 20:32they ingest current events.
- 20:34You know, if you are a, if you
- 20:36have a a twin that's a democrat, they'll
- 20:38read democratic news organizations. If you have one
- 20:41that's a republican, they'll read republican news organizations.
- 20:44So you're able to actually keep them up
- 20:45to speed,
- 20:47you know, even on current events. But
- 20:49regardless of that, we're always back testing. We're
- 20:51always making sure that they're meeting our standards
- 20:54of of
- 20:55matching known,
- 20:57human results,
- 20:59that we have. The second is, you know,
- 21:01right now, we have my team of researchers.
- 21:04I have a team of,
- 21:05you know, analysts
- 21:07and market researchers that we have organizationally that
- 21:10are are the ones who are administering this
- 21:12test because they represent human behavior.
- 21:14So you can lead the witness. So if
- 21:16you don't have someone, you know, at the
- 21:18controls who's engaging with effectively the way it
- 21:21works is an agentic chat
- 21:23and you're not asking the questions appropriately, you
- 21:26can get results that are misleading. So right
- 21:28now, it's my team of researchers
- 21:30that are are looking at that information and
- 21:32validating it, and making sure it's meeting the
- 21:35standards that we would have for human studies.
- 21:38But one of the things I point out
- 21:39there, though, is not to live in an
- 21:40echo chamber. On occasion,
- 21:42the Agenent twins will teach us something new
- 21:44we didn't know, and we shouldn't just be
- 21:45sitting there saying,
- 21:47oh, wait. It it didn't match exactly what
- 21:49we thought in the past, so, therefore, it's
- 21:50wrong. What we need to do is investigate
- 21:53it further. So we make sure we have
- 21:54that process,
- 21:56built out.
- 21:58And then I think the third thing and
- 21:59probably most importantly, I feel like everyone always
- 22:01frames AI as replacement.
- 22:04And as like, what is this gonna replace?
- 22:05It's always the first question you get when
- 22:07you're deploying an AI solution. I don't think
- 22:09this is replacing talking to our customers.
- 22:12It's augmenting our understanding.
- 22:14It's amplifying their voice, as I've said.
- 22:17But, ultimately, we're gonna have to always talk
- 22:19to our customers because that's important, and that's
- 22:21what good companies do. You need to listen
- 22:23to people, and you need to understand what
- 22:24their friction and their pains are. And then,
- 22:26also, it's important to do that to potentially
- 22:28catch emerging issues and things like that. So
- 22:31I view this as additive to what we're
- 22:33doing with our human populations.
- 22:36And I think if you you combine those
- 22:37three things,
- 22:39you know, the the the back testing,
- 22:42the researcher at the wheel, and then always
- 22:44talking to the human populations as well,
- 22:46it's a major it's a it's a set
- 22:48of governance that gives you a lot more
- 22:50confidence in how the twins are operating.
- 22:53And it also helps you amplify the impact,
- 22:56because when you're going out to the various
- 22:57stakeholders
- 22:58and you're doing the change management of saying,
- 23:00hey. Listen to listen to these agentic twins.
- 23:02They're telling us, you know, what to do.
- 23:05The people you're working with have more confidence
- 23:07in you because they know that you're taking
- 23:08the the care
- 23:10and you're doing the work to make sure
- 23:12these things are accurate.
- 23:13Absolutely. And like you said, Shari, I mean,
- 23:15this is it sounds like this is unlocking
- 23:17things that your customers were already feeling and
- 23:19thinking.
- 23:20Anyway, this is now just another way for
- 23:23you to for you to reach to reach
- 23:24that. So really, really fascinating.
- 23:27Anything else we're missing here? Any final thoughts
- 23:30you wanna share with our audience?
- 23:33Yeah. I think, you know, at at CVS
- 23:35Health, it's not just that we're experimenting with
- 23:38this because I think a lot of people
- 23:39will frame this as it it's it is
- 23:41new. And I I get it's an emerging
- 23:43technology, but we were at the forefront here.
- 23:45And I think it's gone beyond experimentation.
- 23:48You know, we're we're at this point. We're
- 23:50at operating at scale. As I mentioned,
- 23:52a 100,000
- 23:54twins. You know, my hope is to get
- 23:56us to 300,000
- 23:57or more in the in the future, but
- 23:59we're using this responsibly at that scale to
- 24:02improve people's lives.
- 24:03And this is giving our teams unprecedented
- 24:06clarity
- 24:07and foresight
- 24:08into, you know, what's happening in the industry,
- 24:10what's happening with our consumers, how can we
- 24:13better serve them, how can we build
- 24:15better experiences? How can we learn faster,
- 24:18and design better?
- 24:20It's it's helping us it's a step change
- 24:23for us in terms of how we actually
- 24:25deliver,
- 24:26health care.
- 24:27And I think in the end, it's gonna
- 24:29help us deliver better health and support for
- 24:31every customer member,
- 24:33that we serve, and we're gonna do it
- 24:35with more confidence, empathy, and understanding.
- 24:37And it's gonna help us achieve our goal
- 24:39of being the most consumer centric company in
- 24:41health care. So,
- 24:43yeah, I I hope everyone listening out there,
- 24:45particularly those in health care,
- 24:48understand that
- 24:49this is a,
- 24:50this is a a a tool
- 24:53that I think can really give your customers
- 24:55an unprecedented voice in the way you operate.
- 24:59100%. I mean, this does seem to be
- 25:01the one of the largest
- 25:03commercial rollouts we've seen of this technology or
- 25:05that we've been, we've heard about in health
- 25:07care on our end. So, Sri, really appreciate
- 25:10you taking the time to chat with us
- 25:12about this, and then please keep us updated
- 25:15as as this all evolves. We'd love to
- 25:17hear more about it. Yeah. Always a pleasure,
- 25:19talking about this, and it was a pleasure
- 25:21talking with you. So excited to come back
- 25:23and tell you all the great things we're
- 25:24doing in the future.
- 25:25And to our audience, if you'd like to
- 25:27listen to more podcasts from Becker's Healthcare, you
- 25:29can visit beckershospitalreview.com.