AI will lead GPs up the garden path to oblivion

Copperfield pits AI against GPs to see what the future may hold for the profession

Welcome to this week’s clinical case. A conifer develops lots of persistent web-like material over its leaves. What would be your differential?

You should be thinking spider mites, spiders or fungus, right? So what if I told you there is no leaf drop or discolouration, and the white paper test is negative? Correct! It’s spiders!

Don’t panic. Not about your conifer, nor about what is happening here. You haven’t dropped into a Gardener’s-World-parallel-universe-column. But I am going to draw a parallel.

The above was an actual problem on my actual conifer which was solved for me by actual artificial intelligence aka ChatGPT. It even invited me to share a photo (with the conifer’s consent) to confirm the diagnosis. The prognosis for the conifer is good, but the one for our profession less so.

I’ve always argued that, come the inevitable AI medical revolution, GPs will be last against the wall. This horticultural epiphany suggests otherwise. If AI can correctly diagnose plant-primary-care-level disease, why not the human equivalent? So, I’ve tested it, using some typical GP presentations, along with photos.

Interesting point #1: A year or so ago, ChatGPT would have responded with a disclaimer along the lines of, ‘Look, I’m just a bot, you can’t rely on me for a diagnosis, go and see a proper doctor’. Now, it gives an RCGP-exam-medal-winning welcome of ‘come in, take a seat, tell me all about it’. It’s totally comfortable playing the medic. What a change in one year! It’s almost like this AI thing can learn.

Interesting point #2: When I fed it the info +/- pic for polymyalgia, glandular fever and actinic keratosis, I obviously hoped that it would come up with powdery mildew, flyspeck and frog-eye leaf spot. But no, it was bang on every time. In ten seconds flat. Differential, likely diagnosis, action? Tick, tick, tick. The only laughable part was its offer, in that final case, to find me a dermatologist. As if there will be any left by the time I finish this blog.

It can’t be long before an app will be able to record and download to ChatGPT-GP heart and chest sounds. Ditto provide an AI enabled analysis of lab tests. And so on. It’s probably happening already. In fact, things are moving so fast that, literally since I started this blog ten minutes ago, the Government has announced a new AI feature on the NHS App called ‘My Companion’, to give patients ‘direct access to trusted health information’.

So it can do almost anything, and it does it faster, more conveniently, and (I’m gagging as I write this) probably more accurately than us. The only bit missing is treatment. But replace Pharmacy First with ‘Pharmacy Instead’, requiring just an AI-stamped diagnosis to dispense AI-recommended treatment, and suddenly the current GP employment crisis will seem trivial compared to what’s to come. As the ‘My Companion’ blurb goes, there are now two experts in every consulting room. One, actually. And it’s not me.

In better news, we’ll have more time for our conifers.

Dr Tony Copperfield is a GP in Essex

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