The government of New Zealand has announced the rollout of artificial intelligence (AI) scribe tools across the country’s national health system.

The AI scribe tools, which have now been implemented in the emergency department of every Health New Zealand hospital, are expected to reduce the administrative burden for frontline clinicians.

AI scribe tools utilise speech recognition and large language models to transcribe patient consultations in real time, and are often integrated with electronic medical record systems.

The move follows an initial pilot of the technology last year, the results of which suggested that doctors were able to see, on average, one additional patient per shift as a result of time saved.

“AI scribe technology is now live in all emergency departments across New Zealand, with the rapid rollout to 1,250 ED doctors and frontline staff complete – 250 more than originally announced following a successful pilot last year,” said Simeon Brown, New Zealand’s Health Minister.

He added: “This places New Zealand among the fastest health systems in the world to move from pilot to nationwide frontline AI use in emergency departments, helping clinicians spend more time with patients and less time on paperwork.”

Following the rollout of AI scribe tools in Health New Zealand emergency departments, the agency will now approve a further 1,000 additional licences for use by mental health teams.

Brown concluded: “AI will never replace clinical skill or judgement, but it will play an increasingly important role in supporting frontline healthcare staff and helping patients access care faster and more efficiently.”

Hospital operator HCA Healthcare implemented Meditech’s Expanse electronic healthcare record systems across 43 hospitals in its network earlier this year.