AI Can Now Prescribe You Psychiatric Medication In Utah

Would you trust an AI to prescribe you mind-altering psychiatric medication? Amid numerous controversies around chatbot therapy or AI giving bad (or dangerous) medical advice, one healthcare provider is betting you will and has received regulatory approval in the state of Utah to do so.

Legion Health has launched a pilot program that will see its AI chatbot, provided by health technology company Doctronic, prescribe prescription medication. There are plenty of caveats, however, about what can and can’t be prescribed. According to the announcement, spotted by The Verge, the chatbot will only prescribe medications that are considered lower risk, for example SSRIs like sertraline (Zoloft) for depression rather than habit-forming drugs like benzodiazepines or some ADHD drugs like Adderall.

In addition, the chatbot will only be able to provide medication which consumers already have a prescription for, rather than doling out entirely new drugs to users. Consumers will be expected to answer 15 questions, covering topics such as their mood, general health, and any side effects from their current medication before receiving their prescription. The service will cost users roughly $20.

“Prescription renewals make up a large portion of healthcare’s daily administrative load,” said the announcement from Utah’s Office of Artificial Intelligence Policy. “By automating these safe, routine requests, Doctronic hopes to help doctors focus more on patient care, reduce delays, and make it easier for patients to stay on track with their medications.”

Other safeguards appear to be in place during the early stages of the project. The first phase of the rollout will include a mandatory review by a human doctor, which will be phased out gradually. Despite these safeguards, many within the psychiatric profession have already expressed concerns ahead of the rollout. John Torous, director of digital psychiatry at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and professor of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, questioned whether any AI system “can understand the unique context and factors that go into a person’s medication” in a comment to The Verge. He added that many patients require “active management” and “careful consideration,” which can be harder to provide via chatbot.

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It’s still unclear if we’ll see more of this type of AI psychiatry in the state of Utah. According to Utah’s regulator, it will gather qualitative and quantitative data on AI’s real-world impact over the year the experiment runs before making any permanent changes to state law. Legion’s management remains hopeful, however, with Legion’s CEO Arthur Macwaters saying that the chatbot could be available in every US state “very quickly.”