Artificial intelligence in medicine

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2024-07-genetic-diagnostics-ultra-rare-diseases.html

AI being used to support diagnosis

 

Influence of believed AI involvement on the perception of digital medical advice (2024)
Reis, Moritz; Reis, Florian; Kunde, Wilfried

Large language models offer novel opportunities to seek digital medical advice. While previous research primarily addressed the performance of such artificial intelligence (AI)-based tools, public perception of these advancements received little attention.

In two preregistered studies (n = 2,280), we presented participants with scenarios of patients obtaining medical advice. All participants received identical information, but we manipulated the putative source of this advice (‘AI’, ‘human physician’, ‘human + AI’). ‘AI’-and ‘human + AI’-labeled advice was evaluated as significantly less reliable and less empathetic compared with ‘human’-labeled advice. Moreover, participants indicated lower willingness to follow the advice when AI was believed to be involved in advice generation.

Our findings point toward an anti-AI bias when receiving digital medical advice, even when AI is supposedly supervised by physicians. Given the tremendous potential of AI for medicine, elucidating ways to counteract this bias should be an important objective of future research.

Link | PDF (Nature Medicine) [Open Access]

 

these results truly don't reflect my experience, the last thing I'd say is that I found human doctors to show more empathy than the simulated empathy of large language models. I also don't think they reflect the experience shared by most ME/POTS/LYME/MCAS, etc sufferers shared on patient groups. The problem of this study, I believe, is that the participating doctors were aware that they were part of a study and that they were being monitored, so their behavior doesn't reflect the typical behavior of a medical practitioner working with the absolute lack of accountability they work in their common practice, and also I'm pretty sure that neglected diseases weren't included as possible diagnosis.