Becker’s Healthcare Podcast
Guest: Rob Purinton, Chief AI Officer, AdventHealth
Date: December 9, 2025
Host: Will Riley

Episode Overview

This episode features a conversation with Rob Purinton, the Chief AI Officer of AdventHealth, a leading U.S. healthcare system. The discussion centers on the role of AI in transforming healthcare, how AdventHealth is balancing innovation with responsibility, and what the future holds for AI-driven care delivery, hospital operations, and the patient experience. Rob provides insight into his unique position, AdventHealth’s strategic priorities, and the practical realities of AI implementation across the sprawling network of care sites.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Introduction to AdventHealth and Rob's Role

• AdventHealth Overview:
  • Operates over 2,000 care sites across nine states.
  • Sees more than 8 million patients annually (00:54).
• Chief AI Officer Role:
  • Newly established in 2025.
  • Rob’s mission continues his two decades focus on process improvement and efficiency.
  • Emphasizes using AI as a tool for “streamline, standardize and to help our organization become a better value proposition for our communities, for our patients and for our purchasers.” (01:34)

2. Strategic Priorities and Vision 2030

• Vision 2030:
  • Framework includes consumer experience, clinical outcomes, financial stewardship, and population health management (02:14).
• Role of AI:
  • AI is an accelerant rather than a replacement for existing strategic goals.
  • Used to support clinical decision-making, reduce clinician documentation time, and enhance patient-provider interactions (03:22).
  • "The goals for healthcare value have not really changed just because AI is here. It’s just given us a new lens to look through and a new set of tools to apply.” (03:36)

3. Pace of Innovation and Cultural Shift in Healthcare Technology

• Accelerated Development Cycles:
  • AI writing code shortens software development timelines.
  • Healthcare compelled to innovate faster: “The typical life cycle for an application today is much shorter than it was for an application released 10 years ago.” (05:35)
  • Frequent need to reassess and iterate implementations.
• Raised Expectations:
  • Tools like ChatGPT have brought AI to everyone’s fingertips, increasing internal and external expectations (06:00).
  • "They're seeing firsthand how quickly they're getting value from it. Just in their everyday lives, their expectations have been raised about getting that value from AI back in their work..." (06:11)

4. Incumbents vs. Insurgents: Innovation Dynamics

• Healthcare's challenge is to learn from rapid, AI-native startups while maintaining organizational stability (07:32).
• “It's really hard for an incumbent to completely transform into an AI native company...I think for many incumbents, the goal ought to be not to be the slowest gazelle in the herd.” (08:23)
• Emphasis on balancing risk and speed: “Our communities trust us, our patients trust us, our caregivers trust us not to just be experimenting with their work. And so we take that sacred trust very seriously.” (08:54)

5. Responsible AI: Governance and Risk Assessment

• Assessment Criteria:
  • Task type (administrative vs. clinical).
  • Human-in-the-loop oversight.
  • Accuracy, bias, and previous adoption reports.
  • Security compliance (e.g., SOC2).
  • “We have a rubric that helps sort into low, medium, high—then...we need a report on this every week, every month or what have you.” (11:36)
• Governance Structure:
  • Executive AI governance committee (quarterly, policy-level).
  • Weekly technical group for hands-on risk reviews with multidisciplinary input (12:10).
  • “So in that forum, we’ll have lots of opportunity to ask questions...and then make our determination.” (12:51)

6. The Chief AI Officer Role in Leadership

• Role created by executive committee in response to AI’s growing strategic importance (13:28).
• Rob’s background in analytics and performance improvement positioned him for this cross-functional leadership (13:45).
• “I’d like to think it’s this combination of a focus on performance, speed, value, as well as a robust technical underpinning and the knowledge about how AI works and what are the risks that it can pose in our clinical environment.” (13:55)
• Collaborates across IT, finance, and clinical leadership.

7. Key AI Strategic Priorities at AdventHealth

• 1. AI Agents:

  • Developing platforms for autonomous or semi-autonomous AI agents.
  • Focus on monitoring, orchestration, and oversight (15:00).

• 2. The Digital Front Door:

  • Making patient engagement seamless: facilitating referrals, integrated scheduling, and reducing administrative barriers (15:40).

• 3. Hospital-Based Innovation:

  • Robotic surgery, computer vision, and advanced support for minimally invasive procedures (16:03).

8. Applications Ripe for AI Transformation

• Revenue Cycle Automation:
  • From authorizations to denial management, revenue cycle is “really ripe for AI agents.” (16:37)
• Clinical Workflow & Decision Support:
  • AI assistants, copilots, and ambient scribes already showing benefit in documentation.
  • Greater opportunities in clinical decision support to aid diagnosis and prevent missed differentials:
    • “AI is very good at keeping in front of you...a low probability risk. We could benefit and our patients could benefit from having those sorts of decision support co pilots more in our environments.” (17:32)

9. Workforce Implications of AI

• Need to repurpose roles from administrative to patient-facing as automation increases (18:29).
• “The clinicians are not going to come out of nowhere...We have to go after every bit of non value added work we can and then that may mean that we need to repurpose roles…” (18:42)
• Goal: Reverse administrative bloat and redirect resources to patient care (19:43).

10. Improving the Patient Experience: The Frictionless Future

• Vision for Digital Front Door:
  • Seamless scheduling, proactive follow-up, and intelligent call routing (20:03).
  • AI to eliminate repetitive paperwork and increase transparency:
    • “We have an initiative...‘Burn all the clipboards.’...You should not be writing down the same things again and again and again and again and again.” (21:23)
• Memorable Exchange:
  • Host jokes: “Yeah, I refuse to do it now.” (21:36)
  • Rob: “That’s wonderful. Brilliant. I like that.” (21:44)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• "I do view this role as a Chief AI Officer as a continuation of that mission to streamline, to standardize and to help our organization become a better value proposition..."
  — Rob Purinton (01:31)

• "AI is an accelerant to a number of our strategic goals... The goals for healthcare value have not really changed just because AI is here. It's just given us a new lens to look through and a new set of tools..."
  — Rob Purinton (03:27/03:36)

• "The typical life cycle for an application today is much shorter than it was...So by the time you get it implemented and adopted...you already have to be looking for the next new thing."
  — Rob Purinton (05:35)

• "It's really hard for an incumbent to completely transform into an AI native company. That's just not really realistic."
  — Rob Purinton (08:23)

• "The clinicians are not going to come out of nowhere...We have to go after every bit of non value added work we can..."
  — Rob Purinton (18:42)

• “We have an initiative...‘Burn all the clipboards.’...You should not be writing down the same things again and again and again and again and again.”
  — Rob Purinton (21:23)

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:54: Rob introduces AdventHealth’s scale and his new role.
• 02:14: Outline of Vision 2030 and AI’s role in achieving it.
• 03:27: AI as an accelerant for healthcare’s enduring goals.
• 04:29: Discussion of the increasing pace of healthcare innovation.
• 07:32: Balancing innovation: learning from AI-native startups and maintaining incumbent responsibilities.
• 10:47: Framework for assessing risk in AI applications.
• 12:10: Explanation of AdventHealth’s AI governance structure.
• 13:28: Creation and purpose of the Chief AI Officer role.
• 15:00: Key AI priorities: agents, digital front door, hospital innovation.
• 16:35: Opportunities for automation in hospital operational areas.
• 18:29: Workforce impacts and the need to shift roles as automation evolves.
• 20:03: The vision for a frictionless, AI-enhanced patient experience.
• 21:23: “Burn all the clipboards” initiative.

Tone & Language

Rob maintains an optimistic, thoughtful, and pragmatic tone, emphasizing both the excitement of new AI tools and the importance of responsible stewardship given healthcare’s trusted position in society. He’s candid about challenges, clear-eyed about opportunities, and often uses analogy and humor to keep the conversation engaging.

This episode is a valuable listen for anyone interested in healthcare transformation, AI strategy, and the realities of large-scale digital innovation in care delivery.