Shiv Rao

Doctors often complain that for every hour they spend with patients, they spend up to two on paperwork. This homework even has a name: “pajama time.” The paperwork deluge is more than just soul-crushing—it’s contributing to what Shiv Rao, the co-founder and CEO of AI-powered medical scribe startup Abridge, describes as a “public health emergency” of doctor burnout.

“Nothing crushes my soul more than having to come home after clinic and know that I have three hours in front of the TV at night just documenting,” says Rao, a practicing cardiologist at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.

With a patient’s consent, Abridge records a doctor visit, automatically transcribes it, and creates a summary for the patient and other physicians. Doctors seem to love Abridge, according to a study conducted by the healthcare research firm KLAS Research. Rao also reports a “waterfall” of glowing feedback.There are other companies in the AI-medical scribe industry—most notably Nuance, which Microsoft bought for $20 billion in 2022. But even Nuance’s former long-time CEO and chairman, Paul Ricci, has observed Abridge's leadership in the space. “I think Abridge is ahead technologically. I think they’re ahead in terms of deployment,” Ricci told Forbes in February. Now serving as an advisor to venture capital firm Lightspeed, Ricci oversaw the group's investment in Abridge in 2023. Rao says they have roughly 50,000 clinicians contracted to use Abridge, with about half coming from a partnership with healthcare giant Kaiser Permanente. But Rao doesn’t want to stop there. “We want to be a part of every single medical conversation for every single patient,” he says.