How GPT and LLMs could usher in an era of 'intelligence-based medicine'
SAN DIEGO – As the HIMSS AI in Healthcare Forum kicked off Thursday morning, Rob Havasy, senior director of informatics strategy at HIMSS, provided a series of introductory remarks that reflected on more than a decade of healthcare IT innovation.
“I've seen a lot of technologies come and go,” Havasy said. But with artificial intelligence, especially in the year-plus since ChatGPT captured the public's attention in a big way, “it feels a little different this time.”
Whatever the use case or type of automation technique – clinical or operational applications, broad and narrow AI, predictive analytics or generative and LLMs – “AI is no longer a futuristic concept,” he added. “It is a daily reality in our hospitals and clinics.”
AI has great potential, but that comes with great responsibility to use it properly, says Havasy. There are important issues in patient safety, model transparency, privacy and security, efficacy, regulation, education and more that need to be urgently addressed.
That was why approximately two hundred clinical and technology leaders had gathered to learn from each other about this still emerging but rapidly evolving technology.
“There are no experts here with 25 years of experience,” Havasy says. Because IT news in healthcare is still so new in its current form, 'we are all discovering this together'.
To kick off the two-day conference, he introduced Dr. Harvey Castro, a practicing ER physician, Chief Clinical Operating Officer at ViTel Health and Assistant Professor at UT Austin. He is also the author of numerous books on AI and healthcare and host of GPT Podcast.
Castro was enthusiastic early on about ChatGPT's promise for healthcare. And he is an enthusiastic user of the technology. His podcast, for example, is largely AI-generated.
“I clone my voice, and I clone my business partner's voice. I go to a medical journal, find something cool: AI in healthcare. And then I let ChatGPT initiate a conversation.”
When it comes to healthcare, he sees great opportunities. For example, he suggests that healthcare providers take a similar approach to automating their approach to discharge instructions, reading information back to patients in a language they understand.
Or perhaps using generative AI imaging to create a coloring book that can help pediatric patients learn about and manage their conditions.
There is of course a lot of potential for genAI. But many people are concerned about how this rapidly changing and largely untested new fact of life will affect the healthcare providers who deploy it and the patients they care for. But Castro is optimistic.
“Everyone knows about evidence-based medicine, but have you thought about intelligence-based medicine?” he said. “With AI we can improve and see things” – from basic patient engagement patterns to complex structures of neural proteins.
AI has developed rapidly and most doctors are embracing it, but some are still skeptical. According to Castro, most should rest easy, at least for now.
As he sees it: “AI-plus-human is better than humans alone.” But for now, at least, humans are better than AI.
Mike Miliard is editor-in-chief of Healthcare IT News
Email the writer: mike.miliard@himssmedia.com
Healthcare IT News is a HIMSS publication.