“If you're a practicing clinician, you are inheriting the output from these AI tools.”

Dr. Minal Shah knows that patients are increasingly making healthcare decisions before they ever reach a health system’s website, portal, or app. They’re using ChatGPT, search, wearables, and home monitoring tools to interpret symptoms, decide where to seek care, and arrive at appointments with recommendations already in hand. For clinicians, the output of consumer AI is already becoming part of the clinical encounter.

In this AMDIS Roundtable, Gregg Malkary sits down with Dr. Minal Shah, Dr. Eve Cunningham, and Dr. Deepti Pandita to explore what happens when AI impacts if and how patients reach a health system's digital front door.

The results can cut both ways. Dr. Shah has seen patients arrive better informed and clearer about their priorities, allowing the visit to begin “from a point of better knowledge for both parties” and creating more room for shared decision-making. Dr. Cunningham has also seen patients convince themselves something is wrong, including one who visited three different urgent cares in 24 hours after repeatedly turning to a chatbot for guidance.

That creates a practical challenge for health systems: helping patients find useful guidance while protecting against unreliable recommendations, incomplete information, delayed care, and unnecessary utilization. Dr. Pandita sees an opportunity to build AI into tools patients already encounter, including pre-visit questionnaires, where it could add “depth and perception” while making information easier for patients to provide and clinicians to interpret. Dr. Shah describes a more structured handoff from these tools that could create value for both patient and provider.

From patient navigation and data governance to quality oversight, clinical workflow, and workforce capacity, these three informatics leaders examine where AI is already helping, where caution is warranted, and how health systems can create value for patients and staff as these tools become part of everyday care.

All roads leading to the digital front door are becoming more complex. Dr. Pandita sees the opportunity for AI to help patients navigate them: “Every step through the healthcare journey, it becomes your sort of partner in navigating the healthcare system.”