A new survey found that most physicians are open to using AI, but they’re unhappy with how their organizations are implementing the technology.
A survey of 1,000 physicians by tech company Offcall found that more than two-thirds of surveyed physicians (67%) said they use AI daily in their practices and 89% use it weekly. The survey also found that 84% of physicians said AI helps them do their jobs better, and 78% said they believed AI will make patients healthier within 10 years.
But an even bigger number—81%—said they’re dissatisfied with how their employers are rolling out AI into their workplace, and 71% said they have no input into how AI is being introduced into their work.
“My opinion means nothing,” one respondent said. “Tools getting rolled out and we’re expected to just use them.”
“We get no communication,” another said. “Tools just appear in the EHR one day.”
Speed of adoption was another big concern, with only 19% of physicians saying they’re happy with how fast AI is being introduced into the clinical setting. Some said pilot programs never seem to launch, making them feel like their organizations are falling behind.
Physicians complained that the C-suite talks about implementing AI, but clinicians don’t see AI tools being rolled out. Some physicians said they’re using AI platforms like ChatGPT on their own.
The only group of physicians in the survey that were satisfied with AI technology were those in private practice.
More than two-thirds of physicians (67%) said that having a bigger say in AI would increase their job satisfaction.
When asked how they would want to use AI, 65% of physicians identified documentation and scribing. About half (48%) identified administrative burdens and 43% identified clinical decision support.
When the survey asked physicians what they feared about AI, several respondents worried that the technology would be used by insurers and payers, not patient care.
Other physicians worried they would find themselves in a Catch-21 situation legally. If AI makes a mistake, for example, physicians worry they’ll be held legally responsible. Others said they worried they would be sued for not using AI if something goes wrong.
More information on the survey is on Offcall’s website.
This survey highlights a critical disconnect in healthcare AI adoption. Physicians overwhelmingly embrace AI’s potential for documentation, admin relief, and decision support yet feel sidelined by top-down rollouts lacking their input.