Generative AI is undoubtedly the buzzword of the year, and the internet is flooded with news on chat GPT developed from OpenAI. It has passed law, business, and medical exams, qualified as a level 3 coding engineer at Google, outperformed microbiology students, and so on.
Chat GPT is the later generation of a large language model (LLM) designed to generate text from user input and has a lot of discussion regarding its potential in medicine.
As a founding Designated Institutional Official of a graduate medical education program and an AI enthusiast, I am eager to explore the current landscape of AI in medical education and what we can expect from ChatGPT and other AI applications in the coming decades.
Why Integrate ChatGPT in Medical Education?
ChatGPT passed all three U.S. medical licensing exam parts without specialized training or reinforcement. Medical students typically spend 400 to 500 hours preparing for USMLE Steps 1,2 and 3, and some international medical graduates may take even more time.
Researchers at Harvard Medical School piloted ChatGPT’s utility as an adjunct for radiologic decision-making. Their results include:
The tool could show the adequate steps for patients requiring breast cancer screening.
The generative AI model accurately determined the clinical workflow of hypothetical patient cases.
Artificial intelligence and machine learning are ingrained in our daily lives. We already see myriads of AI tools for every task. Everyone must have a foundational grasp of AI to assess these tools.
However, researchers have also raised issues in considering ChatGPT for clinical uses. It generates nonsensical output to the provided prompt. Yet, the tool can be trained to perform better.
What is Google’s Med-PaLM?
Google announced the release of Med-PaLM- a large language model designed to answer healthcare-related questions. This model was trained on six existing medical data sets and a new one created by the developers. It can answer questions about medical conditions and the associated symptoms.
A medical chatbot trained on medical data and interactions can be a huge asset. Patients can turn to these chatbots for reliable, timely, and valuable information. Physicians can use these chatbots to get information from all the medical studies. They don’t need to skim millions of research articles from resources like Pubmed.com, as ChatGPT will do the legwork for them.
What are the Use Cases of ChatGPT in Medical Education?
Integrating Generative AI and ChatGPT into medical education has numerous benefits for students, residents, fellows, and faculty. The following are some of the applications of ChatGPT in medical education:
Clinical Simulations
Virtual Simulation and training allow students and house staff to practice complex procedures on virtual patients. Students can work at their own pace and repeat procedures until they have mastered them.
Interactive Learning
ChatGPT can be a virtual tutor, providing interactive learning experiences for medical students, residents, and fellows. It can answer questions, explain complex medical concepts, and provide detailed explanations for better understanding. Students can interact with ChatGPT to clarify doubts and dive deeper into topics. They can practice independently by revisiting the content and experiencing more consolidated learning.
Revision and Exam Preparation
Students can use ChatGPT as a study companion during their exam preparation. They can ask questions about specific topics, seek clarifications, and receive instant feedback. ChatGPT can provide comprehensive explanations, highlight key points, summarize clinical cases, and offer mnemonic devices to aid memorization.
Assist Faculty
Chat GPT can help generate test material, exercises, questions, descriptions, explanations, summaries, and other material. It can be an efficient assistance, saving their time and effort.
Assist in Scoring
ChatGPT can automate student scoring by effectively assessing student papers and essays. The tool will analyze a paper’s sentence structure, vocabulary, grammar, and clarity.
Quick Access to Information
ChatGPT can provide accurate and up-to-date information on medical topics in seconds, including diseases and their management or medical procedures. Medical students and house staff can quickly access the information or clarify doubts during patient rounds or didactics.
Continuing Medical Education (CME)
ChatGPT can assist healthcare professionals in lifelong learning by providing up-to-date medical information and informing them on the latest research, guidelines, and best practices. Physicians can discuss with ChatGPT to expand their knowledge and receive evidence-based recommendations.
Language Learning and Medical Terminology
ChatGPT can help improve language skills and comprehension for non-native English speakers pursuing medical education. It can provide language support, explain medical terms and abbreviations, and offer pronunciation assistance. ChatGPT enhances communication abilities in medical settings.
Virtual Patient Interviews
ChatGPT can simulate patient interviews for history-taking and patient communication training. It can portray various patient personalities, allowing students to practice effective communication, empathy, and bedside manner. Students can learn to ask relevant questions, listen actively, and provide appropriate responses.
ChatGPT as Research Assistant
ChatGPT can help researchers, physicians, medical students, residents, and fellows develop new research topics based on the prompts.
What are the concerns and limitations of ChatGPT?
ChatGPT is an AI tool with its limitations and concerns. Here are the significant concerns regarding ChatGPT:
Data Accuracy
The main limitation and concern of ChatGPT is the accuracy of data. The model needs more data input after 2021 and often provides vague or nonsensical answers not supported by evidence. ChatGPT also generates non-existent references to base its output and produces inconsistent responses to similar prompts.
Academic Misconduct
Secondly, we need to be careful of its misuse by medical students. They can use ChatGPT to submit assignments or research papers, considered academic misconduct.
How the Integration of ChatGPT Will Transform Medical Education?
Healthcare is one of the most critical fields; AI will transform it. We are already seeing the use of AI for imaging, screenings, eye scans, and X-rays. Integrating AI into the medical education curriculum will make medical students and residents more familiar and comfortable with the latest technology.
They can learn the fundamentals of AI and its use in healthcare delivery during their academic years. It will enable them to use AI tools to bring better patient outcomes. The curriculum must include the fundamentals of AI and ML, making medical students, residents, fellows, and faculty familiar with the technology.
As a medical educator who has implemented innovative curricula into graduate medical education, I strongly recommend that AI training be on a fast track as technological advances are leapfrogging.
Sources:
ChatGPT – Reshaping medical education and clinical management – PMC (nih.gov)
Medical schools are missing the mark on artificial intelligence (statnews.com)
ChatGPT’s role in medical education: Advantages and limitations – India TodaI