Bassett Healthcare Network empowers its legal team with Thomson Reuters CoCounsel Legal

Key results

• Reduced contract review time from hours to minutes using AI-powered document analysis
• Decreased reliance on outside counsel by enabling faster in-house legal research
• Accelerated response times for internal client inquiries

Executive summary

Headquartered in Cooperstown, New York, Bassett Healthcare Network is an integrated health system serving a 5,600-square-mile region across eight counties in Central New York. The network includes hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, community and school-based health centers, and health partners in related fields.

Bassett Healthcare Network adopted CoCounsel Legal to strengthen the efficiency and capabilities of its in-house legal department. With CoCounsel Legal, the team now conducts rapid contract reviews, legal research, and document drafting from a single AI-powered platform — enabling faster responses to internal clients and reducing dependence on outside counsel.

Doing more with less

Healthcare legal departments across the country face growing demands, and Bassett Healthcare Network is no exception. Like many healthcare organizations, Bassett Healthcare Network is facing increased pressure to do more with less. “As the trend goes in healthcare, we’re asked to do more and more with less and less,” says Darrell Katsch, Contract Administrator in the legal department at Bassett Healthcare Network

Compounding the challenge, a broader demographic shift in the workforce has made it increasingly difficult to recruit experienced legal professionals. “A lot of seasoned veterans are dropping out of the workforce because they’re retiring,” Darrell Katsch explained. “And for a rural health care organizations such as Bassett, we’re located in an area where we don’t have the same kind of resources that New York City or, for instance, Los Angeles might have.” The team needed a way to maintain high-quality legal support while managing growing caseloads and rising pressure to keep outside counsel fees in check.

Faster answers, broader capabilities, and a more empowered team

Since adopting CoCounsel, Bassett Healthcare Network’s legal team has seen measurable improvements in both speed and scope of work. Internal client response times have dropped dramatically. “If it’s an email that flies into me that maybe I don’t know the answer immediately, it’ll probably take me about three minutes on CoCounsel,” Darrell Katsch said. “I can usually come up with a rule or a case scenario where the rule might fit this situation and get that email turned around so much faster.”

The tool has also helped reduce reliance on outside counsel. “Before CoCounsel, we relied so much on outside counsel to provide answers or just network with each other to try to find the answers,” Darrell Katsch reflected. “With CoCounsel, you can get a basic understanding of the problem, even though you’re not the subject matter expert, and get a fairly close answer.” This capability has proven especially valuable for a team navigating an expanding range of legal questions with limited headcount.

Darrell Katsch’s endorsement of the platform is unequivocal. “If you’re considering to work with Thomson Reuters, I can tell you it’s a reputable company. The integrity is there. The quality of information you get from the prompts you put in is stellar. Couldn’t ask for more.”