Patients prefer AI-generated electronic health record messages

The news: Patients prefer AI-generated electronic health record (EHR) responses over messages from human clinicians, per a recent research letter in JAMA Network Open.

• Stanford Medicine-affiliated researchers surveyed 30 people on their satisfaction with messages written by a large language model developed by the university and clinicians.

Yes, and: AI-generated responses received higher satisfaction scores, both overall and by specialty.

• Satisfaction was highest with responses to questions about cardiology.
• Responses to endocrinology-related questions scored the highest on information quality and empathy.

Unlike AI-generated responses, a shorter clinician message length was associated with lower patient satisfaction, suggesting patients may not like extreme brevity when receiving information about their health.