NUHS projects $2m annual savings from new AI pharmacy platform

NCAIP is also expected to free up 850 pharmacist hours a week.

Singapore's National University Health System (NUHS) expects its new artificial intelligence (AI)-powered pharmacy platform to save up to as much as $2m annually once fully deployed.

The NUHS Cluster AI in Pharmacy platform (NCAIP) brings together four AI tools supporting medication reconciliation, prescription triage, and verification.

The platform is also expected to free up 850 pharmacist hours a week.

This comes as the health system’s pharmacists currently spend over 350 hours a week on medication reconciliation, 190 hours on routine prescription triage and counselling, and 310 hours on inpatient medication verification. 

In the initial phase, NUHS said the MedTriage tool is expected to save up to 94 working hours a week, equivalent to $229,690 in annual cost savings.

It added that NCAIP could also reduce in-person dispensing by up to 20%, allowing pharmacists to prioritise patients who require assistance or counselling.

The system integrates and analyses data from multiple sources to provide a unified view of each patient. 

NUHS said the platform can support the testing and deployment of additional pharmacy AI tools over time.