For general surgery practices
Neela is the AI care companion built for the 30 days after surgery. From pre-op prep through late recovery, Neela reinforces your protocols, prepares your patients, and quiets the phones, all branded to your practice.
Hire NeelaThe practice problem
Three numbers define the operating reality of an independent surgical practice. Each one points to the same gap: the space between what you told the patient and what they do at home.
The average independent practice fields 53 inbound patient calls per physician per day. For a five-surgeon group, that is over 1,300 calls per week landing on a front office that already cannot keep up.
23% of incoming calls go unanswered. Your patients are deciding what to do next based on what they hear back, or what they don't.
MGMA DataDive.
A national cross-sectional study of attending general surgeons using the gold-standard Maslach Burnout Inventory found 69.1% meet criteria for burnout, with 22% in the severe category. A JACS study of all 258 US general surgery residency programs and 1,224 residents found the same rate among trainees.
Your surgeons are taking post-op calls at 9pm. Your MAs are quitting. 88% of clinical staff report moderate-to-extreme burnout, and 71% point to phone-based patient communication as the source.
BMC Health Services Research (2021); Elmore et al., JACS (2016).
A 2025 ten-year follow-up to CRICO's landmark malpractice analysis found that communication breakdowns now factor into 40% of asserted malpractice cases, up from 30% a decade earlier. In surgery, the average indemnity for a settled communication-failure claim is $372,000.
Your malpractice exposure is sitting in the gap between what you told the patient in the consult and what they remember at home.
Candello (CRICO) 2025 Benchmarking Report.
The patient-side gap
Surgical patients are anxious, motivated, and information-hungry. They are turning to ChatGPT between the consult and the OR, and between the OR and the follow-up. The answers they get are generic, confident, and not yours.
85%
of doctors see more AI-informed patients than a year ago.
83%
have corrected AI misinformation mid-visit.
1 in 5
patients hide their AI use from their doctor.
88%
of patients are confident in AI's answer, even when it is wrong.
Source: Zocdoc 2026 AI-Informed Patient Report.
The evidence
Structured digital patient communication has been measured in academic medical centers and randomized controlled trials. The results are consistent.
57.6%
reduction in post-op call volume.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center studied the effect of structured preoperative phone counseling on post-operative call volume. A single, well-designed preoperative communication touchpoint cut post-op patient-initiated calls by 57.6%.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center, peer-reviewed surgical communication study.
78%
reduction in patient-initiated calls.
A 2024 randomized controlled trial published in Acta Orthopaedica tested digital post-operative patient communication against the standard of care. The digital communication arm cut patient-initiated calls by 78% and improved overall patient satisfaction scores.
Acta Orthopaedica, 2024 RCT (Jensen et al.).
96%
patient satisfaction. 1,632 patients.
Northwell Health, New York's largest health system, piloted an AI-driven patient communication tool with 1,632 patients in a high-acuity care window and reported 96% patient satisfaction. The pilot successfully identified urgent conditions the care team would have otherwise learned about by phone, in clinic, or in the ED.
Northwell Health AI care companion pilot. Neela is not affiliated with Northwell. Cited as third-party industry validation.
The product
The same Neela platform, configured for the surgical journey. Pre-op prep, day-of execution, and the recovery arc, in one branded experience.
Welcome Agent
A branded chatbot on your website that answers insurance questions, surfaces self-pay options, and books surgical consults. The curious caller becomes a booked OR slot.
AI Chat
Patients get 24/7 answers grounded in your specific post-op protocols. Wound care, activity restrictions, pain management, what is normal and what is not. Always answered the way your surgeons would answer it.
Tasks and reminders
Pre-op fasting, medication holds, bowel prep, transportation arrangements, post-op wound checks, follow-up reminders. Generated from each visit.
Visit summary
A plain-language recap of the consult, the procedure plan, and the recovery roadmap. Sent home with the patient. Available to them, their partner, and any family caregiver helping with recovery.
Document vault
Surgical consent forms, pre-op clearance letters, imaging reports, pathology, discharge instructions. Patients stop calling to ask where the paper went.
Family coordination
The patient's spouse, adult child, or designated caregiver gets aligned access. The person actually changing the dressing at home has the same instructions your surgeon gave.
The patient journey
Surgical care is not an appointment. It is an arc. Neela is present at every phase, reinforcing your protocols where your team cannot be.
Without Neela
The patient finds your practice, often through Google or a referral. They have questions about insurance, surgeon credentials, and what the consult will involve.
With Neela
Welcome Agent answers initial questions, screens insurance, and books the consult. Patient arrives knowing what to expect.
Without Neela
The patient meets your surgeon, gets a plan, signs consents, and goes home. The next 7 days are a high-anxiety blur of clearance, fasting instructions, medication holds, and questions they didn't think to ask.
With Neela
Sends a plain-language visit summary. Generates pre-op tasks. Answers the late-night questions about NPO timing, blood thinner holds, and what to bring.
Without Neela
The patient arrives. Your OR runs on time, or it doesn't. The variable is whether the patient followed the prep.
With Neela
Final-night reminders. Day-of arrival instructions. Pre-op checklist confirmed in-app.
Without Neela
This is where call volume peaks. Wound questions. Pain management questions. 'Is this normal?' The patient and family member each have a phone in their hand.
With Neela
24/7 answers grounded in your specific post-op protocol. Wound photo uploads with structured guidance on when to escalate. Pain medication taper tracking. Triages the calls that actually need the on-call surgeon.
Without Neela
The patient is mostly back to life. But this is when activity restrictions get violated, follow-up appointments get missed, and the small problems that turn into readmissions show up.
With Neela
Follow-up appointment reminders. Activity-restriction check-ins. Surfaces the patient who is struggling so your team can intervene before they end up in the ED.
The math
Four levers. Each one independently justifies the spend. Together, they are not close.
Call volume
Average independent practice: 53 inbound calls per physician per day (MGMA). Even a 30% reduction (below the lower bound of published studies) recovers significant front-office time. At 57.6% (Vanderbilt) or 78% (Acta Orthopaedica), the math is decisive.
Conservative target: 25 to 40 fewer calls per surgeon per day.
No-show and missed-appointment recovery
The average independent physician practice loses $150,000+ per year to no-shows, with each missed appointment costing roughly $200 in lost revenue. Surgical practices with high-value consults and OR slots see materially larger numbers. Structured digital pre-op communication reduces both no-shows and late arrivals.
Conservative target: 20 to 30% reduction in no-shows and late arrivals.
Malpractice exposure
40% of asserted malpractice claims involve communication failures (Candello/CRICO 2025). The average indemnity for a settled surgical communication-failure claim is $372,000. Neela creates a documented trail of patient communication, plain-language summaries, and acknowledgment that the patient received and reviewed the recovery plan. One claim avoided, even one settled without merit, pays for Neela for years.
Staff retention
71% of clinical staff point to phone-based patient communication as the source of their burnout. Fewer calls, fewer fires, longer tenure. The cost of replacing one experienced surgical MA is $80,000+. Holding onto two MAs covers Neela for the next decade.
One avoided communication-failure claim pays for Neela for the next thirty years.
Sub-specialty fit
A general surgery group is rarely one thing. Neela is configured for the mix you actually operate.
What's different
Long pre-op and post-op behavioral journey. Heavy family involvement. Multi-year follow-up windows.
How Neela's configured
Pre-op behavior change support, lifelong post-op nutrition and medication tracking, family-unit access for spouse and adult children.
What's different
Bowel prep adherence is the difference between case-on-time and case-canceled. Post-op bowel function recovery is high-anxiety.
How Neela's configured
Day-by-day bowel prep guidance. Post-op output tracking. Plain-language 'is this normal' answers for ostomy and resection patients.
What's different
High volume. Outpatient. Recovery activity restrictions drive call volume.
How Neela's configured
Activity restriction reminders, wound photo triage, return-to-work guidance, recurrence symptom escalation.
What's different
Diagnosis is anxiety-heavy. Multi-stakeholder family unit. Often coordinates with oncology and reconstruction.
How Neela's configured
Family-unit access from diagnosis through reconstruction. Multi-team handoff support. Pathology-result preparation.
What's different
Complex post-op course. Drains, diet progression, follow-up imaging.
How Neela's configured
Drain output logging, diet progression guidance, imaging follow-up scheduling, structured 'when to call the office' rules.
What's different
Outpatient with high-anxiety medication management post-op. Thyroid, parathyroid.
How Neela's configured
Calcium symptom monitoring after thyroidectomy. Medication restart guidance. Lab follow-up reminders.
What Neela is not
Surgical practices have been sold a lot of software. Here is what Neela explicitly is not, so you can place it correctly in your stack.
Neela is not your EHR. It does not replace Epic, Athena, eClinicalWorks, or whatever your group is on. It lives alongside.
Neela is not a patient portal. Patients hate portals. They do not log in. Neela is conversational and proactive. It comes to the patient, not the other way around.
Neela is not a clinical decision support tool. It does not tell your surgeons what to do. It supports the patient with what your surgeons already decided.
Neela is not a diagnostic AI. It never gives a medical diagnosis. It reinforces what your surgeons already said and escalates to your team when escalation is warranted.
Neela is not a generic chatbot. Generic chatbots trained on the public internet are the problem. Neela is grounded in your specific protocols, your specific guidance, and your specific patient's history.
Neela is not a marketing widget. The Welcome Agent does help with patient acquisition, but the core product is the longitudinal care companion.
FAQ
Neela is designed to live alongside your EHR, not replace it. We work with Epic, Athena, eClinicalWorks, and other major systems. During onboarding we map the integration to your existing workflow so your team does not have to learn a new system. Your surgeons keep documenting where they document today.
No. Neela is explicitly built to never diagnose. It reinforces what your surgeons already said, answers questions grounded in your protocols, and escalates to your team when escalation is warranted. Every response is anchored in the patient's actual care plan and your practice's specific guidance, not generic medical content.
Patient portals are transactional and passive. The patient has to log in, find the right tab, and ask the right question. Neela is conversational and proactive. It comes to the patient with the right reminder at the right time, answers questions in plain language, and includes the patient's family caregivers. The portal logs the encounter. Neela owns the time between encounters.
Neela is HIPAA compliant, SOC 2 certified, and offers BAAs to every practice. All data is encrypted in transit and at rest. Critically, your patient data is never used to train our AI models. We treat your patients' data the way we would want our own treated.
Standard onboarding is two to four weeks from contract signature. We configure to your protocols, your sub-specialty mix, and your branding. Your staff training takes about an hour total. We bring the work, not the work for your team.
Yes. Flat rate. All six capabilities included. Unlimited patients. Unlimited surgeons in the practice. No per-message fees, no per-patient fees, no setup fees. We picked a price that works for an independent two-surgeon group and a 15-surgeon multi-specialty group equally.
See Neela configured for a general surgery practice in 20 minutes.
Hire NeelaSources
