Physician AI expert cautions clinicians and execs: Be wary of AI challenges

Dr. Ronald Rodriguez, founder of the nation's first MD/MS in Artificial Intelligence dual degree, offers warnings and solutions for generative AI privacy errors, skyrocketing AI usage costs, and AI correcting mistakes resulting in different errors.

Dr. Ronald Rodriguez holds a unique title in healthcare. He's professor of medical education and program director of the nation's first MD/MS in Artificial Intelligence dual degree at The University of Texas at San Antonio. The five-year dual degree was launched in 2023.

Rodriguez, who also holds a doctorate in cellular biology, is at the forefront of AI's transformation of healthcare. He is well aware of all the positive ways AI and automation are benefiting healthcare already. But he also sees some aspects of the technology that should give pause to clinicians and IT executives.

This is part one of a two-part interview with Rodriguez. Here he points out matters of AI in healthcare that require great care by professionals – even places where he believes professionals are getting it wrong. Part two, coming soon, will be in video format and discuss the doctor's groundbreaking work in healthcare AI education.

Q. What are some clinicians potentially doing wrong today with generative AI tools, and how can hospital and health system CIOs and other IT and privacy leaders do to make sure generative AI, today, is used correctly?

A. They are not protecting protected health information effectively. Many of the commercial large language model servers take the prompts and data uploaded to their servers and use it for further training later. In many cases, providers are cutting and pasting aggregate clinical data and asking the large language model to reorganize, summarize and provide an assessment.

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