HOUSTON (AP) — The Houston Astros activated infielder Isaac Paredes off the injured list and placed left fielder Yordan Alvarez on the 10-day injured list on Friday ahead of their series opener against the Seattle Mariners.
Paredes sustained a right hamstring strain at Seattle on July 19 while running to first base on a single. He began running, doing fielding work and hitting at the beginning of September and had been at the Astros' minor league facility in West Palm Beach, Florida, the last two weeks.
Paredes said through an interpreter that he wasn't 100 percent, but he was “close to it.” He was in the lineup at designated hitter batting third on Friday night.
“I’m here to help the team any way I can,” Paredes said. “They told me I was going to be a DH for these (first) couple of days. I practiced my ground balls at third base and second base, so I have to be ready for whatever comes up.”
Paredes is hitting .259 with 19 home runs and 50 RBIs.
Manager Joe Espada said the Astros “are excited to have (Paredes) back."
“We want to get him out there at DH, get him moving around and then, we will see where we go from there,” Espada said. “He worked really hard defensively down in West Palm, but right now, just to get him in the lineup as DH, I think he took a step in the right direction.
“The impact in our lineup, in the clubhouse just to have him back, especially what happened to Yordan a few days ago," Espada continued. “Just to have him in there in the first four spots is a huge impact for our lineup.”
Alvarez, who was placed on the injured list retroactive to Tuesday, sprained his left ankle Monday night against the Rangers.
“He is feeling better,” Espada said. “He was in there getting treatment, walking around without the boot, so that is a step in the right direction. We are really happy to see how quickly he is getting better.”
Espada said Tuesday that Alvarez has a “pretty significant” sprain “that is going to keep him out a while.”
After scoring from first base on a throwing error by Rangers pitcher Jack Leiter on Carlos Correa’s infield single in the first inning on Monday, Alvarez turned his ankle and hobbled toward the dugout. He was tended to by an athletic trainer outside the Astros’ dugout and then helped down the steps.
Alvarez is batting .273 with six home runs and 27 RBIs, but the three-time All-Star has been limited to 48 games this season. A broken right hand forced him to miss 101 games.
In a corresponding move, the Astros transferred right-hander Kaleb Ort to the 60-day injured list.
The Astros and Mariners were tied atop the AL West and had split the season series 5-5 entering this weekend's series.
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/MLB
FILE - Houston Astros' Isaac Paredes runs to first after hitting a single during the seventh inning of a baseball game against the Texas Rangers, Friday, July 11, 2025, in Houston. (AP Photo/Kevin M. Cox, File)
SAN FRANCISCO & JACKSONVILLE, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan 12, 2026--
Abridge, the leading enterprise-grade AI for clinical conversations, is collaborating with Availity, the nation’s largest real-time health information network, to launch a first-of-its kind prior authorization experience. The engagement uses cutting-edge technology grounded in the clinician-patient conversation to facilitate a more efficient process between clinicians and health plans in medical necessity review.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260112960386/en/
Rather than creating parallel AI systems across healthcare stakeholders, Abridge and Availity are working together to ensure shared clinical context at the point of conversation powers administrative processes, such as prior authorization review and submission, improving outcomes for patients and the teams delivering care.
This collaboration unites two trusted and scaled organizations: combining Abridge’s enterprise-grade AI platform, serving over 200 health systems and projected to support over 80 million patient-clinician conversations in 2026, with Availity’s next-generation, FHIR-native Intelligent Utilization Management solution, which helps payers and providers digitize and operationalize coverage requirements within administrative workflows.
Availity’s FHIR-native APIs enable fast, scalable, and secure connectivity of payer information across the entire healthcare ecosystem. With Abridge’s Contextual Reasoning Engine technology, clinicians can gain visibility into relevant clinical information during the conversation to support documentation aligned with prior authorization requirements.
“At Availity, we’ve invested in building AI-powered, FHIR-native APIs designed to bring clinical policy logic directly into provider workflows,” said Russ Thomas, CEO of Availity. “By embedding our technology at the point of conversation, we’re enabling faster, more transparent utilization management decisions rooted in clinical context. We’re excited to collaborate with Abridge and to demonstrate what’s possible when payer intelligence meets real-time provider workflows.”
The development of real-time prior authorization is just a component of a broader revenue cycle collaboration that is focused on applying real-time conversational intelligence across the patient, provider, and payer experiences. The companies intend to support integration by collaborating on workflow alignment between their respective platforms in the following areas:
“Abridge and Availity are each bringing national scale, deep trust, and a track record of solving important challenges across the care and claims experience to this partnership,” said Dr. Shiv Rao, CEO and Co-Founder of Abridge. “We’re building real-time bridges between patients, providers, and payers, unlocking shared understanding, focused at the point of conversation.”
About Availity
Availity empowers payers and providers to deliver transformative patient experiences by enabling the seamless exchange of clinical, administrative, and financial information. As the nation's largest real-time health information network, Availity develops intelligent, automated, and interoperable solutions that foster collaboration and shared value across the healthcare ecosystem. With connections to over 95% of payers, more than 3 million providers, and over 2,000 trading partners, Availity provides mission-critical connectivity to drive the future of healthcare innovation. For more information, including an online demonstration, please visit www.availity.com or call 1.800.AVAILITY (282.4548). Follow us on LinkedIn.
About Abridge
Abridge was founded in 2018 to power deeper understanding in healthcare. Abridge is now trusted by more than 200 of the largest and most complex health systems in the U.S. The enterprise-grade AI platform transforms medical conversations into clinically useful and billable documentation at the point of care, reducing administrative burden and clinician burnout while improving patient experience. With deep EHR integration, support for 28+ languages, and 50+ specialties, Abridge is used across a wide range of care settings, including outpatient, emergency department, and inpatient.
Abridge’s enterprise-grade AI platform is purpose-built for healthcare. Supported by Linked Evidence, Abridge is the only solution that maps AI-generated summaries to source data, helping clinicians quickly trust and verify the output. As a pioneer in generative AI for healthcare, Abridge is setting the industry standard for the responsible deployment of AI across health systems.
Abridge was awarded Best in KLAS 2025 for Ambient AI in addition to other accolades, including Forbes 2025 AI 50 List, TIME Best Inventions of 2024, and Fortune’s 2024 AI 50 Innovators.
Abridge and Availity Collaborate to Redefine Payer-Provider Synergy at the Point of Conversation
Abridge and Availity Collaborate to Redefine Payer-Provider Synergy at the Point of Conversation
