This essay is based on a transcript of a conversation with Dr. Jennifer J. Bryan, 47, about the use of AI voice assistants in the medical field. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I work in family medicine and treat patients ranging from newborns to those in their 90s.
I graduated from my Family Medicine residency in 2006. I practiced in Mississippi for 18 years and joined the Hattiesburg Clinic a year ago.
I work 40 hours a week at the clinic, but I was spending a lot of time outside of work hours recording patient records – record keeping was taking up an extra 10-20 hours a week.
Last fall, I started using Suki AI, an AI-powered voice assistant, to keep track of my patient interactions, and now I use it all the time.
It reminded me of the old days of medicine, when we weren’t constantly typing notes into a computer. It allowed me to interact with patients more naturally and reduced the stress associated with note-taking a lot.
While I am in favor of using AI for note-taking, I am hesitant to use it for other purposes in the medical field.
Previously, I typed notes or used dictation software
When I first started working as a physician in 2006, I took handwritten notes. Although I would occasionally get cramps, I was able to take notes during consultations.
With the introduction of electronic medical records, doctors were able to type up notes, but typing while interacting with patients was distracting, so most typing was done during lunch breaks or on the couch at home. At this time, the time spent writing notes increased significantly, leading to burnout for many doctors across the country.
As president of the Mississippi State Medical Association, I talk to a lot of physicians who tell me that all the clicking and typing has put an extra burden on their lives. I’ve never been burned out, but I’ve often felt stressed and have tried to alleviate that stress.
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I started using dictation software about six years ago. I would speak into a handheld microphone and the software would type out what I was saying. It was a great product, but it took time to verbally reproduce it at each visit, and some words were misspelled or misheard.
A fellow physician at my practice suggested I try an AI assistant to help me take notes. I signed up for a trial of Suki AI, which I’d heard was recommended by the American Academy of Family Physicians, and a competing product. I preferred Suki, and I still use it today.
(Editor’s note: A Suki AI spokesperson told BI that the company has no financial affiliation with either the Hattiesburg Clinic or the AAFP, and that the list price for the technology is $399 per provider per month.)
How does an AI assistant work?
Suki is an AI assistant app on my smartphone that I use to take notes. When I enter a patient’s room, I ask the patient for consent to use the software. I press the record button and my smartphone listens to my conversation with the patient. I leave the room and the recording stops.
The dictation software I used previously couldn’t create a summary of what I said, but Suki can generate summary notes from my appointments and send them to my computer.
If my cell phone is out or I don’t have it with me, I can talk to Suki directly about the appointment, and it creates robust notes just as if I were listening in on the conversation in the exam room, but I find them more accurate if I carry them in the room with the patient.
At the end of the day, I spend 15 minutes on the computer going through my notes, making sure the AI spelled the medications correctly, and organizing them—a stark contrast to the 10 hours a week I was spending taking notes.
Being a very legal person, one of the first questions I had about Suki was how long it would store patient information for. I felt comfortable with how privacy was handled when I learned that audio and recordings of patient interactions are deleted from Suki after seven days. Notes are sent to a computer before being deleted from Suki and are stored in the electronic records forever.
Using AI in the workplace reduces stress, but the technology is not perfect
I now use Suki a lot, and the service fee is deducted from my salary.
My workflow has become easier. I can fit more patients into my schedule. My patients notice that I no longer have to type and can maintain eye contact without having to look at the computer.
My personal life is less stressful. Family comes first, so I never miss family events because of work, but I used to push myself too hard and have to stay up late to finish my notes. Now, when I’m at home, I watch movies with my family and do my homework, so I don’t have to type up work notes on my laptop.
Technology isn’t perfect, and sometimes when I write up my notes I have two paragraphs that say almost the same thing and then I delete one when I edit, and sometimes they misunderstand the medicine I say and write something different.
I don’t see this as a problem. Doctors’ scribbles are prone to mistakes, and so are other dictation software. As doctors, we have a responsibility to ensure our notes are accurate. Any technology will require an acceptable amount of editing.
I am in favor of using AI for transcription and cautiously welcome it in other areas of medicine.
AI has been a part of healthcare for quite some time now, especially in the fields of radiology and surgery.
When it comes to medical records and transcription, I believe AI will provide a welcome relief from typing for doctors who are trained to diagnose and treat, not type.
I don’t think AI will ever replace doctors, but I can imagine it taking over the careers of medical scribes, who sit in exam rooms and type for doctors, and are very expensive to hire.
I am cautiously welcoming the introduction of AI in the medical field. There are certainly benefits to be had in helping human medicine, such as detecting breast cancer. But I am wary of AI making mistakes that could affect patient life and safety. In medicine, we should never underestimate the value of human interaction and understanding pain and emotion.
I’m all for using AI for transcription and visit aggregation, but we need to make sure there are proper guardrails if we go beyond that.
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