Main image courtesy of BoardVitals.

Those outside of the healthcare profession may not realize it, but physicians have been using AI for quite some time—however it has never been so prevalent as it is today. You’ll find AI has been very helpful in a variety of tasks essential to the medical field, and has even transformed how some facilities manage workflow and patient care. But how exactly are physicians using AI in 2024? In this article we’ll be discussing just that and more including:

• How doctors are using AI
• The benefits of AI in healthcare
• If AI will replace doctors

You’ll find AI applications are suited to a wide variety of medical specialities, and you’ll see that facilities of all sizes can benefit from integrating it more into their processes. 

How doctors are using AI

In what ways are physicians incorporating more AI into their practices?

Is your doctor currently using AI in some capacity? Although you may not see it, the answer to this is most likely yes, as AI is available to physicians to perform a variety of tasks. The main goal of AI in healthcare is to help clinicians better care for their patients, by performing tasks faster, with more accuracy, and more efficiency than a human could. An algorithm can never replace the human aspect as well as the experience and critical thinking of a physician. This is why it’s created to augment the clinician’s care, and improve outcomes for patients. So how are physicians using AI? 

To transcribe notes and streamline administrative processes

One of the most common ways for physicians to start harnessing the power of AI is to let it assist with administrative tasks. Clinicians want to focus on patient care, although they are also responsible for essential administrative tasks such as note documentation during patient encounters. There are AI medical scribes (like Playback Health) that are very easy to integrate into a busy day of encounters. These applications can be downloaded onto a smartphone or tablet, and after gaining patient consent, the provider just needs to turn it on and it will start transcribing the conversation. 

The AI uses this transcription to create a note of the encounter that documents the patient’s medical information, diagnosis, and any treatments, tests, procedures, or prescriptions that the doctor orders. This information is then put in the patient’s EHR so everyone on the team has immediate access to the most up to date information. 

These AI scribes can save clinicians a lot of time when they don’t have to enter notes manually, and they can include information that a provider may have left out or just did not include. This not only increases the accuracy of these important notes, but it reduces the burnout often felt by providers who must enter the information in addition to seeing patients. 

AI scribes can also streamline the patient journey, and automate a lot of the check in and check out process, as well as provide follow up information and contact the patient when it’s time to schedule an appointment. 

You’ll also find AI assisting with other administrative tasks such as medical coding and billing. In order to be financially stable, any physician’s office must ensure that patient procedures are accurately coded, ensuring insurance companies are billed appropriately. AI applications can transform this process because they can use machine learning to digest enormous amounts of data. This helps determine the most appropriate codes for the procedure that will most likely be approved for payment by the insurance company—ensuring bills are paid on time and the facility can budget accordingly. 

Improve diagnostic support

Another major area that you’ll see AI assisting physicians is in improved diagnostic support. Whether you need to look at x-rays, MRIs, scans, or other types of images, AI software can greatly improve upon the accuracy and efficiency of this essential process. The AI is given access to data that includes all different types of images so that it can learn to see patterns and recognize items such as fractures, implants, tumors, or other information that would help give an accurate diagnosis. As it analyzes the image, the AI will flag any areas of concern for a doctor to review.

Physicians are highly trained to read medical imaging as well, however the AI system can do it with a greater degree of accuracy and much more quickly. This means that patients will receive a speedy diagnosis and the medical team can start working on a treatment plan as soon as possible.

Accurate diagnoses and better treatment planning

Using AI to help make a diagnosis and provide treatment can help eliminate issues that prevent accuracy such as environmental bias, racial bias, and shortcuts. Doctors may be making diagnoses with bias without even knowing it, leading to inaccurate treatment plans that are not in the best interest of the patient. When you use AI to assist with this, you can help eliminate some of these issues. 

With the assistance of AI, physicians can provide better treatment plans that can offer the best possible results for patients. AI can use its data analysis capabilities to consider the patient’s medical information and the potential treatments available to suggest some options that would benefit the patient the most. This level of customized care for patients is a great asset, and although the AI can give options to the physician, it is up to the doctor to make the final decision using their knowledge and experience to choose the path forward. 

Increased patient engagement

When patients feel that they’re being listened to during encounters and when they can more easily contact their doctor, they are more satisfied. AI allows physicians to concentrate on patients during an encounter instead of typing information, and applications such as chatbots can answer questions or schedule appointments or send reminders to patients. 

What percentage of doctors are using AI?

Anything that is new, such as AI, will take time for everyone to be 100% comfortable with. The good news is that the majority of doctors seem to be embracing the addition of AI into their practices. According to a 2023 AMA study of 1,081 doctors, nearly two thirds responded that they saw how advantageous implementing AI into their plans of care could be. And according to a 2024 study, 40% of physicians are ready to use generative AI with their patients. Clinicians seem to be cautiously hopeful about AI, and while most can see the benefits in some areas, they want to ensure that patient privacy and data transparency are paramount. 

The benefits of physicians using AI

Incorporating AI into daily care will have positive effects on patients and doctors

While some doctors may be tentative to include artificial intelligence in their practice, there are some serious benefits to AI.

• Improves patient care. This is the primary objective of physicians, and implementing AI can help them do just that. Not only can AI help during encounters by allowing the doctor to focus solely on the patient, but it can also make it easier for patients to contact their physician and ensure that they have had the necessary follow up care. In addition, AI can also help improve patient outcomes by getting quicker, more accurate diagnoses, getting a customized treatment plan, improving prescriptions recommendations, or decreasing the length of stay in a hospital or outpatient center. 

Patients who are satisfied with their care and believe that their care team is open to finding better solutions (such as integrating AI) will continue to see those particular physicians. 

• Improves processes. AI is one of the best ways to streamline workflows, and it can take cumbersome processes (like coding and billing) and make them much more efficient. Eliminating guesswork, assumptions, and human error can have a big impact on the financial capabilities of the healthcare facility. 

It can also assist with team-based work flows that coordinate all the information into one central hub. AI makes it easier to share information between team members, and gives everyone access to the most up to date patient information.

• Reduce burnout. We’ve already seen how ambient AI scribes can help reduce physician burnout by automating the transcription of their notes. But it can also be used to reduce additional workload on an already overworked care team. If healthcare facilities must do more with less staff, then AI is a great tool to take away tedious administrative tasks so that team members can focus on more emergent issues. 

• Use data to get better. AI is excellent at analyzing data to suggest areas for improvement. This data can be used to see where processes can be improved, or how clinicians can make better treatment decisions. Having all this data is one thing, but unless you’re using AI to analyze trends and point out areas that can be improved upon, a healthcare team is not working as smart as it could be. 

Are there any drawbacks of using AI in healthcare?

While there are many advantages of using AI in healthcare, it does not come without drawbacks. 

• There are ethical concerns when it comes to bias and patient privacy. The AI is only as accurate as the data it is trained on, and it must be exposed to all kinds of scenarios and population demographics for it to make more accurate diagnoses. Patient privacy is paramount, and the use of sensitive medical information needs to be properly encrypted and stored. 
• The physicians are ultimately responsible for their patients, but what happens when there is a mistake or someone is misdiagnosed? There is also an issue when the AI suggests a treatment that the patient or the family does not agree with. What would be the best way forward then? 
• AI systems can make errors known as "hallucinations.” This is not incredibly common but it can occur, potentially leading to the wrong diagnosis or a mistake in the patient’s record.
• It is essential that healthcare professionals are not over-reliant on AI, either deferring to it without taking the time to think critically and relying on their experience. Doctors must rely on their own training to be confident enough to make a different judgment call.
• Some healthcare professionals are concerned with the cost of implementing AI into their current system, and helping team members learn to use the AI effectively. 

Will AI replace doctors?

There is some resistance by those in healthcare to AI since it is newer and there are legitimate concerns with transparency, ethics, and patient privacy. Others are worried that AI will take jobs away from humans, but no one thinks that AI is going to replace doctors. Medicine is something that needs the bond of doctor and patient in order to provide the best possible care. The human factor is very important in order to provide the best level of care. A doctor cannot only rely on data and an algorithm to care for their patients, and AI is designed to assist doctors, not replace them. 

How will including AI in your facility improve patient outcomes?

If you’ve always wanted to see the benefits of including AI in your healthcare practice, now is the time to do so. Whether you want to see how an AI medical scribe can save clinicians valuable time, need better diagnostic tools, or want to improve patient care after a procedure, there are AI applications that can help with all of that.