Artificial intelligence is transforming the everyday practice of medicine — from simplifying diagnostic workflows to helping clinicians make faster, more informed decisions. To explore how AI can enhance efficiency and trust in diagnostic testing, Becker’s Healthcare spoke with Brian Caveney, MD, Chief Medical & Scientific Officer at Labcorp.
Question: Many leaders view AI-enabled efficiency as table stakes. How do you see Test Finder contributing to clinical and financial value creation for health systems beyond time savings?
Dr. Brian Caveney: Test ordering may seem like a small part of the day, but when you repeat it hundreds of times a week, every extra click or delay adds up. Research shows providers spend over three hours a day on administrative tasks such as documentation and test identification—time that could be spent with patients. And according to a recent American Medical Association (AMA) survey, 57% of physicians view addressing administrative burden through automation as the greatest opportunity for AI in healthcare.
Saving time is important to operational efficiency, but it’s just one part of the equation. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 14 billion laboratory tests are ordered each year, and 70% of medical decisions hinge on their results. Diagnostic tests are essential to patient care and critical to public health.
Labcorp recently launched Test Finder, a generative AI tool developed with Amazon Web Services to improve test selection for providers and health systems. It allows clinicians to easily search for lab tests using plain language, streamlining decision-making and improving patient care.
Q: What are some of the common barriers to adoption and what lessons has Labcorp learned from early deployments that could help health systems accelerate adoption while minimizing disruption?
BC: In general, one of the biggest barriers to the adoption of new technology is added complexity. If a tool is difficult to incorporate into a workflow—adding friction or requiring intensive training, for example—it will likely be ignored in busy care environments.
That’s why one of Labcorp’s main priorities when developing Test Finder was making sure it was clinically relevant and operationally usable from day one, prioritizing clinician input in the development and evolution of the tool. Early deployments and beta testing of Test Finder were designed to capture real-world feedback, which shaped how the tool interprets clinical language and displays results. Test Finder was designed to be intuitive, with no logins or new systems to learn, and is embedded into platforms clinicians already use, including their EHR. This makes Test Finder feel like a natural part of the workflow, not another system to learn.
Follow-up: What advice would you give leaders preparing their organizations for the adoption of AI-driven diagnostics?
BC: Successful AI adoption stems from solving a real clinical challenge, rather than merely adding technology for technology’s sake. Engage clinicians early and make them part of the design process. When they trust the tool and see that it simplifies their workflow or improves the patient or staff experience, adoption happens more naturally.
Q: How is Labcorp ensuring Test Finder maintains trust as it scales across diverse EHR environments and more sensitive use cases?
BC: From a clinical perspective, Test Finder is designed to empower clinicians with a tool that helps them streamline the test selection process. It’s important to note that Test Finder does not recommend what test a clinician should use; it simply delivers a list of relevant tests from Labcorp’s validated catalog based on a clinician’s input. We built Test Finder in collaboration with our medical and scientific teams to deliver results that accurately reflect what a clinician is searching for.
On the infrastructure side, Test Finder was built on Amazon Web Services’ HIPAA-compliant infrastructure through Amazon Bedrock and integrated using FHIR standards to provide interoperability and security.
Q: You’ve mentioned plans for subspecialty expansion and new diagnostics. Do you see Test Finder evolving into a platform that surfaces precision medicine opportunities?
BC: As new genomic and molecular tests become part of everyday practice, the complexity for clinicians increases. Test Finder can bridge that gap by surfacing targeted testing options based on the specific clinical context of each query, and it can even surface new or relevant tests physicians might not yet be aware of, given how quickly diagnostics are advancing and how much information clinicians are required to absorb every day.
Q: How can tools like Test Finder support more strategic partnerships between health systems and diagnostic networks to drive the future of healthcare?
BC: Diagnostics are often overlooked in system-level innovation, despite being a critical part of care. Tools like Test Finder bring intelligent support directly into daily workflows, supporting clinical quality, reducing administrative back-and-forth, and shortening turnaround times.
Over time, it also opens doors for more data-driven collaboration, using insights from testing trends to improve clinical pathways and system-wide efficiency.
Q: Is there anything else you’d like to share that we haven’t touched on?
BC: The promise of AI in healthcare isn’t just about automation. It’s also about solving real, everyday challenges that stand between clinicians and better patient care.
There’s enormous potential to bring intelligence to routine moments in medicine, not just complex ones. Whether it’s helping a clinician select the right test or enabling a health system to scale clinical consistency across hundreds of sites, the right tools—embedded in the right workflows—can drive meaningful, measurable improvements in how care is delivered.
