General Internal Medicine Physicians

These days, doctors still do most of a general internist’s job. AI tools are starting to help, though. For example, some telemedicine systems use AI interview bots to suggest likely diagnoses.

In a large study of virtual doctor visits, providers agreed with an AI’s diagnosis 84% of the time ^[1]. AI chatbots and “symptom checkers” can give doctors a list of possible conditions to consider ^{[1] [1]}. Hospitals also use software to automatically pull patient data, fill out forms, or generate simple reports.

A recent review found that in primary care, most AI use is still experimental or limited to things like automatically writing notes or flagging lab results ^[2]. In short, machines can crunch numbers, spot patterns (for example in heart monitors or glucose logs) and even summarize a visit, but they cannot replace a doctor’s judgment. Giving shots or comforting a sick person still needs a real human.

Overall, AI augments doctors – it helps with research, paperwork, and double-checks – but internists are still in charge of diagnosing and caring for patients ^{[1] [1]}.

AI is slowly coming into medicine, but there are good reasons for that pace. Hospitals have to pay for new technology and make sure it is safe, which can be expensive ^{[1] [3]}. Rules about patient privacy and safety add extra steps: it takes time to get approval or prove an AI tool works well for real patients ^{[3] [3]}.

Doctors also worry about trust. If an AI is a “black box,” they want to understand how it got a result – and who is responsible if it’s wrong ^{[3] [1]}. On the plus side, there is a big shortage of primary care doctors (hundreds of thousands are expected) ^[4], and busy physicians are eager for help.

Many clinics already use simple AI assistants – for example, voice tools that write down the visit – which have cut doctors’ paperwork time by most of the evening hours ^{[4] [1]}. In general, experts say AI will be adopted step-by-step: first for paperwork and basic checks, and more later as people get comfortable. Patients and doctors need time to trust these tools, but most agree that careful AI (used under a doctor’s watchful eye) can be a big win for health care ^{[3] [4]}.