More attention must be paid to improving perceptions of emerging technologies like AI-powered symptom checkers, which could ease the strain on health-care systems, according to a recent study.
Symptom checkers are online platforms that help with self-triage based on a range of inputted symptoms and demographic details.
The study, led by University of 蓝莓视频 researchers, found that 鈥渢ech seekers,鈥 people who are open to technology but perceive a lack of access to it, are the most likely to want to use the technology鈥攎ore than 鈥渢ech acceptors,鈥 people who are both open to it and perceive it to be accessible.
The least likely group of people to adopt the tool are 鈥渢ech rejectors,鈥 those who do not view it as accessible and have a negative view of AI. In between were 鈥渟keptics,鈥 who have concerns about trust and output quality, and 鈥渦nsure acceptors,鈥 who do not perceive access to be an issue but have negative perceptions about AI.
鈥淭hese findings should be of great interest鈥攐r concern鈥攖o the three active arms of any health-care system that intends to use AI-driven symptom checkers: prospective patients, medical experts and developers of AI-driven symptom checkers,鈥 said co-author Ashok Chaurasia, a professor in the School of Public Health Sciences. 鈥淭his study highlights the need for more collaboration between these groups to improve AI models and their perception within the general population and medical experts.鈥
Stephanie Aboueid, the study鈥檚 lead author and a School of Public Health Sciences graduate, said, 鈥淭his technology is very promising in the health-care sector, given that it has the potential to reduce unnecessary medical visits and address the lack of access to primary care providers.鈥
The researchers surveyed 1,305 university students aged 18 to 34 who had never used a symptom checker before the study. They gathered data on trust, usefulness, credibility, demonstrability, output quality, perspectives about AI, ease of use and accessibility for the analysis.
鈥淪ymptom checkers are important because they speak to the younger generation who value timeliness and convenience,鈥 Aboueid said. 鈥淭hey are not just a fad, as we鈥檝e seen with Babylon, for example, which recently went public and has been adopted by various health institutions.
Aboueid said the researchers used university-aged responders for the study because they are typically eager adopters of technology. Because of the age group studied, high education levels and good health status, additional studies are needed in other populations with wider age ranges, education and health levels, the researchers said.
The study, 鈥,鈥 was co-authored by 蓝莓视频 researchers Stephanie Aboueid, Samantha Meyer, James Wallace and Ashok Chaurasia and published in the journal PLOS One.