Artificial intelligence is increasingly becoming part of everyday pharmacy operations at Salt Lake City-based Intermountain Health, where more than 300 AI tools are now in use across the health system.
Several of those tools have been deployed within pharmacy services, helping automate documentation, prescription routing, patient outreach and administrative workflows.
“Using AI in pharmacy services is less about replacing work and more about reshaping how that work gets done,” Matt Higley, PharmD, chief pharmacy officer of Intermountain Health, told Becker’s.
Among the tools currently in use are ambient listening technology, which helps pharmacists document patient encounters, a platform that identifies and routes prescription requests and refill orders while reducing duplicate submissions, and an AI tool that supports patient onboarding, benefits verification and refill reminders. Epic-integrated AI tools are also being used to assist with chart reviews, authorizations and verification workflows.
The primary goal behind the deployments has been to reduce repetitive administrative work that can slow pharmacy operations and pull clinicians away from patient care. According to Dr. Higley, AI is helping improve the speed of authorizations and prescription fulfillment while reducing processing delays and errors.
The technology is also changing how pharmacists spend their time. Documentation tools allow clinicians to focus more fully on patient conversations rather than taking notes during encounters, while AI-assisted chart reviews can help surface relevant information more quickly. Administrative tasks such as sorting, categorizing and routing incoming faxes can now be partially automated, allowing pharmacists to focus more on clinical decision-making.
While the results have been encouraging, implementation has not been without challenges.
One of the biggest obstacles has been data quality. Following Intermountain’s transition to Epic from multiple legacy platforms, some historical information remains fragmented or unstructured, making it more difficult for AI systems to consistently interpret data. Missing or incomplete information can lead to inaccurate outputs, requiring pharmacists to carefully validate recommendations and information generated by the technology.
Dr. Higley also noted that pharmacy-specific AI solutions remain relatively immature compared to tools available in other industries.
“Unlike many other AI tools, there is no off-the-shelf pharmacy option available,” he said.
As a result, pharmacy teams often play an active role in training and refining AI workflows. Frontline caregivers help develop prompts, review outputs and correct inaccuracies while continuing their day-to-day responsibilities.
That reality highlights what Dr. Higley sees as the current state of AI adoption in pharmacy: the technology is delivering value, but it still requires significant human oversight.
“In many ways, the work hasn’t gone away — it’s just moved upstream,” he said. “Instead of manually completing every step, teams are now partnering with the technology, guiding it and improving it in real time.”
For now, Intermountain is seeing the greatest benefits in structured, high-volume operational tasks such as documentation, chart review, refill management and patient outreach. More complex clinical workflows continue to require extensive validation, but Dr. Higley said the long-term opportunity remains clear: using AI to reduce administrative burden so pharmacists can spend more time engaging with patients and applying their clinical expertise.
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