AI Is Changing the Way Patients With Cancer Learn About Their Disease

Artificial intelligence (AI) platforms are providing a new way for patients with cancer to learn about their disease, and as such, things are moving into a “post-Google” era, according to Dr. Will Ngwa, associate professor of radiation oncology and oncology at Johns Hopkins University and director of the Global Health Catalyst program.

Ngwa explained that AI platforms such as ChatGPT will directly answer people’s questions, and provide sources to learn more information, while traditional search engines will provide a list of references that patients then need to sift through to determine what is appropriate for them, personally.

READ MORE:ChatGPT Can Answer Cancer Questions, But Clinician Input Still Vital

“So I think it's really powerful now that you we have this opportunity that the AI (or) chatbot can actually have a conversation, and an actually really meaningful conversation that includes even emojis. So he does things that (make) you feel like it's actually listening to you,” Ngwa said in an interview with CURE®.

Transcription

It's a very different experience … We're moving post-Google in that sense.

(When) you have to Google you put in the search terms, Dr. Google is going to tell you maybe different references you can read and get that information from, and you have to scroll down, find them and then decide which ones are appropriate.

Now, (with AI) it's kind of flipped, where the chatbot is really having a conversation with you, and even suggesting what other questions you should want to know, (topics) you may want to know more about, but it's already searched all that stuff and (is) able to come back (to) you with exactly what you want and then giving you references, saying, “If you want to learn more, read more here” versus, “OK, here are the different references, find what you want,” which is still useful.

So I think it's really powerful now that we have this opportunity, that the AI (or) chatbot can actually have a conversation and (it can be) an actually really meaningful conversation that includes even emojis. So it does things that (make) you feel like it's actually listening to you, and knows (you). So it becomes (about) “How do you ask the question?”

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