New details emerge of UChicago, City Colleges' Washington Park lab campus. October 07, 2026 05:15 AM CDT UChicago Medicine plans to build a four-story, nearly $328 million clinical lab building along Garfield Boulevard near Washington Park, in a collaboration with the City College of Chicago, which will follow it up with a four-story Malcolm X College lab technician training center on adjacent property. Access this content, additional healthcare industry coverage, exclusive newsletters and more. Health Pulse - Annual $399 for 1 year, renews automatically These 14 families wield influence across Chicago and Illinois through business, politics, philanthropy, sports and civic institutions.

UChicago Medicine names 1st AI, data chief. By: Giles Bruce University of Chicago Medicine has appointed Josh Denny, MD, its inaugural senior vice president for AI and precision medicine and chief data officer, effective November 2026. Dr. Denny, who will also serve as vice dean, has been CEO of the NIH's All of Us Research Program since 2020, overseeing a national research initiative that has enrolled nearly 900,000 participants and generated more than 535,600 whole genome sequences. He previously spent more than two decades at Nashville, Tenn.-based Vanderbilt Health, where he founded the Center for Precision Medicine and developed phenome-wide association studies, a method that scans patient records for conditions linked to genetic variants. At UChicago Medicine, Dr. Denny will work across the health system, research division and university to connect AI, genomics and clinical informatics. UChicago has contributed nearly 16,000 participants to All of Us and leads the Illinois Precision Medicine Consortium, which has enrolled more than 62,000 participants statewide. The appointment builds on UChicago Medicine's Elevate 2035 strategic plan to unite research, clinical care and technology. Monday, September 28 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM CDT Presenters: Cathie Abrahamsen, RN, MSN, DNV Healthcare|MaryJo Barnett, RN, MSN, CRRN, HCA Florida West Marion Hospital|Neda Mitova-Caneva, PT, MPT, GCS, West Marion IRF Next up in executive moves. * Ascension Saint Thomas taps new vice president of joint ventures Jeremy Mercer was named vice president of joint ventures and chief integration officer of Ascension Saint Thomas in Nashville, Tenn.,... By: Madeline Scheetz * WVU Medicine taps 6 new leaders Morgantown, W.Va.-based WVU Medicine has named six new leaders across the health system. Amy Bush was appointed president of WVU... By: Madeline Scheetz * Texas Health names hospital president Arlington-based Texas Health Resources named Jon Duckert president of Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Southlake, effective Oct. 1. Mr. Duckert... By: Kristin Kuchno

How UChicago Medicine shifted staff to 'more difficult' revenue cycle work. By: Alan Condon UChicago Medicine is using automation to move revenue cycle staff away from routine insurance and prior authorization tasks and into more complex cases that require human judgment. Matthew Kennedy, director of patient access and financial clearance at UChicago Medicine, discussed the health system's strategy during a panel at Becker's 11th Annual Health IT + Digital Health + RCM Conference and said the system had significant amounts of manual work tied to insurance verification, prior authorization, imaging and routine procedures. "We didn't have anything broken so much as we had a lot of manual work," Mr. Kennedy said. UChicago Medicine partnered with a vendor to automate portions of that workload through Epic-integrated workflows. Routine cases can now be checked automatically, while exceptions are routed to staff for further review. Now the health system is clearing about 95% of certain cases up to 28 days before the scheduled service - roughly 12 days earlier than before. "It really helped take care of a lot of the imaging work, a lot of those simpler surgeries," he said. The technology is best suited for more predictable cases, according to Mr. Kennedy, who said more complex procedures still require experienced employees to review clinical documentation, payer requirements and other details. "AI is not going to know the clinicals that you're going to pull," he said. "It's not going to know the information to help get that verification or that authorization." UChicago Medicine has not reduced headcount as a result of the automation. Instead, employees have been reassigned to more complicated work. "AI does not mean that you're going to lose staff," Mr. Kennedy said. "Your colleagues aren't going anywhere. They have this depth of knowledge. But we were able to move them to those more difficult things." That expertise is being redirected toward areas such as complex surgeries, labor plans, payer follow-up and cases where prior authorization or predetermination requirements are unclear. Mr. Kennedy also cautioned against treating AI as a fully autonomous solution. "AI automation is a really cool tool, but it's just a tool," he said. "You shouldn't rely solely on it." He said UChicago Medicine maintains teams that review automation results and monitor payer changes rather than simply accepting what technology or vendors return. "I love skeptics," Mr. Kennedy said. "AI is not a 'set it and forget it' thing. AI is going to make mistakes." Those employees can help identify changes in payer rules, portal requirements or documentation standards before they create larger problems. Mr. Kennedy said successful automation also depends on adoption by employees. "Implementation and adoption - those are two different things," he said. "Just because you have that tool, it doesn't mean that it's being used appropriately. It doesn't mean it's being used correctly." For UChicago Medicine, the goal is not to automate every revenue cycle task, but to use technology where it can reliably handle routine work and preserve employee expertise for cases that require more judgment. "It's better to put them towards those exceptions, those difficult cases," Mr. Kennedy said. Tuesday, September 29 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM CDT Presenters: Frank Stevens, Strata|Josh Wiggins, Strata Next up in revenue cycle management. * Kaiser to lay off 147 workers across California Kaiser Permanente is laying off 147 employees across several cities in California, the Oakland-based health system said in regulatory documents... By: Jakob Emerson * Louisiana hospital considering service adjustments, denies closure Zachary, La.-based Lane Regional Medical Center is not closing, but facility leaders are evaluating service line adjustments to meet community... By: Madeline Scheetz * 'Automate your bread and butter': How Northwestern processes 400,000 tasks with a 3-person automation team Chicago-based Northwestern Medicine has built a three-person revenue cycle automation team that processed about 400,000 tasks over the past fiscal... By: Alan Condon