Physicians preferred AI-written hospital discharge summaries in 95% of cases in a Stony Brook study
The retrospective study in npj Digital Medicine covered 60 Internal Medicine admissions of 7 to 21 days; both AI and human summaries contained errors, and the ratings do not show effects on patient outcomes.
Why it matters
Discharge summaries are the handoff from hospital teams to outpatient doctors, and long admissions with many notes make them hard to write well. In this study, hospitalists and primary care physicians rated the AI drafts higher for overall quality, readability and conciseness, factual accuracy and completeness. The university says the system produced drafts within minutes, but that is generation time, not the time clinicians need to check them. The next test is use in clinical practice, including verification time and effects on patients.
Key facts
- Preferred AI summaries in 95% of hospitalizations evaluated
- 60 Internal Medicine admissions lasting 7 to 21 days
- Published in npj Digital Medicine
- Reviewers: hospitalists and primary care physicians
- Both AI and human summaries contained errors
- Retrospective study at Stony Brook University