AI chatbots showing the potential to assist patients in many different industries, including health care. Recently, Mount Sinai’s Dean of Artificial Intelligence and Human Health, Thomas Fuchs, suggested that AI will be key to keeping high levels of medical care in the United States. One of the most notable chatbots related to health care is ChatGPT, a product of OpenAI, which provides accurate and fast responses to voice-recognition commands in a friendly and conversational tone.
However, experts are cautious in regard to relying on chatbots instead of an in-person visit with a medical professional, since a comprehensive understanding of the patient and their condition will be lost. There is also the potential for perpetuating false information. Dr. Daniel Khashabi from Johns Hopkins University warns that relying too heavily on AI can pose a “collective danger for our society”. To ensure accurate results, the information provided by chatbots should always be approved by a doctor.
One of the most promising capabilities of AI chatbots is providing administrative help to patients. Scheduling appointments, refilling prescriptions and providing information about medications are all within the capability of ChatGPT. The chatbot can also provide helpful advice on mental health and coping with difficulties such as depression and anxiety. However, ChatGPT’s parent company, OpenAI, cautions against using the chatbot as a replacement for a physician’s care and emphasizes the need for a disclaimer to inform users of the chatbot’s potential limitations.
The Artificial Intelligence company OpenAI, founded by Elon Musk, developed ChatGPT as its latest AI project in December 2022. By combining natural language processing with machine learning, ChatGPT offers users a unique conversational experience, allowing them to receive answers quickly in a clear and relatively natural way. Even though it is not classified as medical technology, specialists including Dr. Justin Norden of Stanford University believe ChatGPT could potentially be extremely beneficial for administrative tasks in the health care industry.
As AI technology continues to progress, ChatGPT and similar products can play a beneficial role in health care, as long as their use remains managed and monitored closely. AI chatbot technology has the potential to offer high quality and reliable advice, but it must be properly policed to ensure inaccurate information is not spread among those desperate for answers.
