Physicians are embracing clinical GenAI—in theory, at least

More than two-thirds of U.S. physicians have changed their minds about generative AI over the past year. In doing so, the re-thinkers have raised their level of trust in the technology to help improve healthcare.

That’s according to a survey of 100 medical doctors who work in a large hospital or health system, see patients and use clinical decision-support software. The survey was conducted online in February by Wolters Kluwer Health.

The researchers further found 40% of U.S. physicians ready to use “point-of-care GenAI” as long as they’re confident in the specific tool they have in hand for the purpose.

In reporting the results, Wolters Kluwer Health offers four key observations:

1. Saving time is an eagerly anticipated benefit among physicians who would be willing to use GenAI at the point of care.
    
   • More than two-thirds of physicians (68%) say GenAI can save time by quickly searching medical literature.
      
   • 59% say GenAI can save time by summarizing data about a patient in the electronic health record (EHR).
      
   • More than half (54%) believe GenAI will save them 20% or more time looking for data to assist in clinical decision-making.
      
2. Physicians view GenAI as a tool that can help optimize the work of care teams.
    
   • 4 out of 5 of physicians (81%) say GenAI can improve care team interactions with patients.
      
   • More than half say GenAI can support continuing education (57%) and day-to-day tasks (56%).
      
   • Almost half (46%) say GenAI can coordinate scheduling across the care team to facilitate timely care.
      
3. The most important criteria for physicians is content source transparency.
    
   • For the majority of physicians (58%), the No. 1 most important factor when selecting a GenAI tool is knowing the content it is trained on was created by medical professionals.
      
   • Before using GenAI in clinical decisions, 9 out of 10 physicians (91%) would have to know the materials it sourced from were created by doctors and medical experts.
      
   • 89% would be more likely to use GenAI in clinical decision-making if the vendor was transparent about where information came from, who created it and how it was sourced.
      
   • 76% would be more comfortable using GenAI from established vendors.
      
4. A gap persists between physician preparedness and patient readiness for GenAI in healthcare.
    
   • Compared to results from Wolters Kluwer Health’s 2023 consumer survey “Generative AI in Healthcare: Gaining Consumer Trust,” physicians are more ready for GenAI in healthcare than their patients.
      
   • The majority (66%) of physicians believe their patients would be confident in their results if they knew their provider was using GenAI to make decisions about their care, but almost half (48%) of Americans would not be confident in the results.
      
   • While only 1 out of 5 physicians believe patients would be concerned about the use of GenAI in a diagnosis, most Americans (80%) say they would be concerned.

“Physicians are open to using generative AI in a clinical setting provided that applications are useful and trustworthy,” comments Peter Bonis, MD, Wolters Kluwer Health’s chief medical officer, in a news release. “The source of content and transparency are key considerations.”

Read the release here and view an infographic here.