We sat down with Sneha Patel, CEO, COO, MPAS, PA-C of Metroplex Medical Centres, to discuss how leadership-driven AI adoption helped her organization scale without adding headcount.
As Metroplex grew from two to nine clinics, Sneha and her leadership team faced a familiar challenge: rising patient demand paired with FTE-heavy administrative work across intake, phones, scheduling and payments.
In this conversation, Sneha shares why Metroplex chose to adopt AI intentionally—not to replace people, but to remove administrative burden—and how that decision led to higher revenue, lower costs and full schedules without any marketing spend.
Q: You’ve called Phreesia a game changer. What makes you say that?
Sneha: Every week we meet across departments, and the story is consistent—revenue up, costs down and schedules full. That’s not a coincidence.
We didn’t get there by working harder. We reduced FTE-heavy tasks so our teams could focus on patients.
Q: Where has AI made the biggest impact?
Sneha: Payments, scheduling and refills—especially on the phone. Instead of hiring more staff to handle high volumes of patient calls, we’re using technology to solve problems at scale.
When AI takes on repetitive calls, it frees our people to do the work that actually requires a human.
Q: How did you balance automation with the human touch?
Sneha: Some patients want a live person, and that’s okay. The key is giving people options.
We use voice automation where it helps—triage, transcripts and tasking—while keeping a path to a live person. What matters is access and accountability. Every call is documented, and every request gets closed. That level of accountability actually improves compliance and trust.
Q: What changed operationally?
Sneha: Patient registration used to take an enormous amount of manpower—forms, data entry, scanning and fixing issues after the fact.
What we learned is that registration is not just a front-desk task. It sets everything else in motion. When registration is done well and done early, patients arrive prepared, no-shows and cancellations drop, billing is cleaner and teams aren’t scrambling downstream.
Once we removed friction from registration and made access easier from the start, everything flowed better across the organization.
Q: What advice do you have for leaders hesitant about AI?
Sneha: This isn’t just a check-in or phone project. It affects every department and the livelihood of the company. Leadership has to be involved from day one.
You can be afraid of AI, or you can remove the administrative burden so people can focus on patients and deliver the human touch patients deserve.
Once you see the results—revenue improving, costs coming down, teams breathing again—the change is undeniable.
Q: You’ve also been involved in beta programs and broader industry efforts. Why was that important to you?
Sneha: I didn’t just want something that worked for us—I wanted to help make it better for other practices too.
We’ve been through a lot transforming Metroplex, and if our experience can help others avoid those mistakes, that matters. I’ve participated in beta programs and shared feedback with the Phreesia team, and I’m also starting to think about how best technology and best practices could scale across the ACO I work with.
If something is improving access, efficiency and care, more practices should have the opportunity to benefit from it.
Key takeaway
Metroplex didn’t adopt AI to replace people. They adopted it to remove administrative burden, protect revenue and give teams the time to care for patients.
Choose efficiency over fear—and let your people do what they do best.
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