AI + EQ: Raising healthcare's game

No, this paragraph wasn’t written by ChatGPT. We need more than party tricks in healthcare. So, what does AI really have to offer us and, as we think about Mental Health Awareness Month, how can we use tech to increase, not limit, our ability to reach people? I’m not talking Woebots.?

In a pilot program with UC San Diego Health , UW Health , and Stanford Health Care , AI is reading patient messages and drafting responses from doctors, reducing the workload of an overstressed workforce (who spend as much as half their time on admin vs 29% with patients). In the Mayo Clinic ’s cardiology department, doctors are using AI to detect new cases of heart failure, potentially years earlier. The AI sees warning signs in ECGs too subtle for humans to spot.?

Powerful stuff. But not all powerful. Human care remains every bit as vital as machine learning. A study in the US and Norway found that people give more information to emotionally-attuned physicians than those who ask good questions but remain detached (kind of like… AI). Turns out, before a patient talks about emotional parts of their medical history they give hints, often with gestures. If a doctor responds to these cues with questions but little non-verbal attunement, the patient discloses nothing. But if the doctor shows this kind of attunement in critical moments, the patient opens up and gives a fuller history. A relationship is formed. Key information is shared. There’s a chance of improved diagnosis and treatment.

What healthcare needs isn’t one thing or the other. It’s AI + EQ. A combination of artificial and emotional intelligence, people and technology, data scientists and medical professionals, working together for exponential impact. It’s the integration of both that will improve healthcare for all.?

AI will help us humans provide even better experiences, outcomes, and savings to our fellow humans by doing some of the work behind the scenes, often work we couldn’t do otherwise, at least not at scale. It will provide better personalization, automation, and documentation, helping not just patients but care and clinical teams by giving them back time for more human touch and thoughtful decision-making. Imagine a veteran doctor facing a complex new case. AI can help her review all current literature and be sure she misses nothing.?

Yes, AI raises thorny questions, as Geoff Hinton and Charlie Munger pointed out just last week. In healthcare alone, chatbots will reach 2.8B interactions annually this year. Meanwhile a new JAMA study has found AI to be empathetic. Five medical professionals were asked to grade human and AI responses to 195 online health questions. The AI responses got 4 times as many “good” or “very good” ratings, and 10 times more grades of “empathetic” or “very empathetic”.

A man-made diamond can be as sparkly as the mined kind. But is imitating empathy in text the same as embodying it? Can it create real long-term relationships, exert personal influence, inspire someone? The value of human insight hasn’t changed.

We’ve always needed the human touch, we haven’t stopped, and there’s no better time to remember this than now, as more and more people face behavioral health challenges, among others, needing ever more nuanced attention and care. Today we have a fresh chance to make the most of a new technology, and make the most of ourselves.