The AI Arms Race in Administrative Health Care

The Business of Health with Chip Kahn The AI Arms Race in Administrative Health Care July 14, 2026 Video Audio About this Episode Episode 12, AI Series: Caroline Pearson, executive director of the Peterson Health Technology Institute (PHTI) and the Peterson Center on Healthcare, joins Chip to discuss who really benefits as AI moves into health care’s back office. A quiet arms race is underway — providers deploying AI to code, bill, and capture revenue and insurers deploying it right back to review, deny, and hold the line. The open question is whether any of this lowers what the country actually spends or just speeds up the fight over the dollar. Pearson brings a rare vantage: PHTI runs rigorous, independent evaluations of health technology — from a now-famous assessment that found digital diabetes tools didn’t lower the total cost of care, to its own examination of the administrative AI arms race in prior authorization and medical billing. She and Chip dig into whether AI can deliver better care and real savings, or simply more activity — and how incentives and policy decide which way it breaks. Note: KFF partners with the Peterson Center on Healthcare on the Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker, which monitors how well the U.S. healthcare system performs in terms of quality and cost. The Host Chip Kahn Sr. Visiting Fellow Charles N. Kahn III is a senior visiting fellow at KFF. He is also a visiting senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a nonresident senior scholar at the University of Southern California’s Schaeffer Center for Health Policy & Economics. He serves as co-chair of the international Future of Health collaborative. Guest Caroline Pearson Executive Director, Peterson Health Technology Institute; Executive Director, Peterson Center on Health Care Caroline Pearson is the Executive Director of the Peterson Health Technology Institute (PHTI), where she leads efforts to evaluate the clinical and economic impacts of digital health solutions. She is also Executive Director of the Peterson Center on Healthcare Leadership, where she leads initiatives and grantmaking to fulfill the Center’s mission to create a high performing health system that delivers better care at lower cost. Pearson was previously the Senior Vice President for Healthcare Strategy at NORC at the University of Chicago, a nonpartisan research organization. Prior to her work at NORC, Pearson was the Senior Vice President of Policy and Strategy at the consulting firm Avalere Health. Pearson is an elected member of the National Academy of Social Insurance. She is honored as a Crain’s New York Business Notable Leader in Health Care. Pearson graduated Magna Cum Laude from Harvard University with a B.A. in Government. SERIES This weekly podcast features insightful conversations between host Chip Kahn and his guests, who discuss the business of health care, connecting the dots between the health care business, policy, and patients. The podcast’s first series on AI in health care illuminates how AI is changing health care, and features guests who are deploying this technology, managing its consequences, and designing policy around it.