This is reported by Ukrinform with reference to NOS.

“Patients who ask written questions to medical staff at the UMCG in Groningen receive an answer generated by a chatbot. Doctors only need to check the answer and correct it if necessary,” the message states.

The hospital claims to be the first hospital in Europe to use AI in this way and believes that with the help of AI, the consultation process has been significantly accelerated, freeing up more time for the patient offline.

“If medical professionals now have to spend less time on such administrative tasks, there will be more time left to pay more attention to the patient,” said ENT doctor Tom van der Laan in an interview with RTV Noord.

It is stated that approximately 1,200 patients every week ask hospital doctors questions about issues such as medication use, how to relieve pain or scan results.

The chatbot function in the electronic patient file reads these questions and offers answers based on the processed information.

Robot reactions are governed by rules. Providing personal medical advice is not allowed, but general medical information is allowed. If the patient wants to know if he or she can fly again after surgery, the robot can tell him/her that is allowed in six weeks.

There is also always a doctor or nurse who checks the response before it is sent.

According to the ENT doctor, the robot’s responses are even friendlier than those of medical professionals. Van der Laan stated that doctors answer questions briefly, while artificial intelligence not only gives more informative and complete answers, but also does it more precisely.

The doctor also added that the robot’s answers to questions are the first small step in making artificial intelligence more widely used in healthcare.

According to him, this is the beginning of a new era in medicine, especially due to the lack of personnel.

As Ukrinform reports, American company Google is in talks to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in Character.AI, while the fast-growing start-up for the development of artificially intelligent chatbots is seeking capital to train its models.

Photo: ANP