As US medical debt grows, AI will be used more to collect it

Medical debt in the United States is anticipated to rise due to recent Republican-led health care cuts, according to a report by the Urban Institute and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Artificial intelligence (AI) will play an increasingly significant role in the debt-collection ecosystem, including taking notes in exam rooms, coding visits, sending billing messages, and powering AI agents to text patients in billing portals.

According to April Kuehnhoff, a senior attorney at the National Consumer Law Center, medical debt will impact both insured and uninsured individuals due to higher out-of-pocket costs resulting from plan changes. AI companies are positioning themselves to capitalize on the growing medical debt market, with AI-driven billing platforms like Cedar targeting uninsured and Medicaid-eligible patients.

Cedar uses AI to predict patients' propensity to pay and match them with AI-driven discounts, as well as deploying an AI chatbot named Kora to communicate with patients about their bills. While some analysts see AI coding as an early win, others have raised concerns about the potential for higher healthcare costs and inaccurate billing due to AI tools.