News Center

Originally published in The Tennessean, April 2026

When people reach out to their health plan, they’re not thinking about technology first. They’re thinking about getting help. They want answers that are quick and easy to understand. And they want confidence that their personal information is safe.

Those are valid expectations, and technology has raised the bar for convenience and speed. But health care is complex, highly regulated, and deeply personal.

At BlueCross BlueShield of Tennessee, we’re adopting AI to help employees work faster, solve highly manual problems, and reduce unnecessary friction in everyday processes.

We’re also helping employees build new skills while keeping strong safeguards in place around data privacy and human oversight.

People expect innovation to improve their experience, not create new risks or uncertainty.

Members want clearer explanations about their coverage, with shorter wait times and help navigating a complex system. Employers need help managing their health care dollars, and they want good experiences for their team members who are seeking care.

Meeting both expectations requires smarter ways of working, along with clear boundaries for how technology is used.

One of the first places we integrated AI was in customer service, where speed and clarity matter most.

Our teams built and piloted an AI tool with a select group of customer service representatives who serve our members. The goal was to help our representatives answer some of the most common questions on coverage details, prior authorization requirements, and other benefit details more quickly.

Representatives can use AI to pull details from across our systems to view the most relevant information in one place. That allows them to spend less time searching for answers and more time focused on the person they’re helping. We’ve always trained our service representatives to review and confirm details using their own judgment. Now, we’re pairing speed with human expertise.

Improvements like these help us operate more efficiently, supporting affordability while still delivering the service people expect.

Equipping employees to use AI responsibly is just as important as the technology itself.

We’ve made AI education a priority, so our teams understand how to use these tools appropriately and where the boundaries are. My colleagues in human resources are leading extensive training programs and facilitating peer-to-peer learning.

I’ve seen value from their work firsthand. I recently experimented with building an AI agent to help evaluate how ready we are to launch a program, using it as a checklist to test assumptions and flag gaps before rollout. It didn’t replace my judgment or decision‑making, but it helped quickly surface questions we needed to answer.

As we learn together, our technology teams are making sure we introduce tools securely, thoughtfully, and with the right oversight.

For example, we only use tools that meet our enterprise data protection standards. AI is used to support our teams, not replace judgment. Decisions about care remain grounded in scientific evidence about what is safe and effective, and they’re made by clinicians.

Our approach reflects what customers expect from their health plan: to manage complexity, control costs, and deliver dependable service on their behalf. AI is one of the technologies that helps us meet that responsibility.

We’ll continue to test and scale these tools – and share how they’re improving service, supporting affordability, and keeping our focus on our members. When it’s used with purpose and care, AI can help deliver more value for the Tennessee employers, members and communities we serve.