Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has been integrated into American health settings in many ways. While AI offers significant potential to improve health outcomes and system efficiencies, its integration into primary care settings also raises questions about equity, trust, consent, and the future of patient/provider relationships.

To ensure that AI tools support equitable and human-centered primary care, it is essential to understand how people experience and perceive these technologies in their healthcare — especially people from communities whose perspectives are not typically represented in tech product development, who have been historically underserved by the medical community, or who are typically less trusting of doctors.

We’re partnering with the Commonwealth Fund to conduct a qualitative design research study around the integration of AI technologies in primary care settings, with a particular focus on patient populations that have been historically underserved by and/or are mistrustful of the US healthcare system. Our research will seek to identify how patients feel about existing integration of AI in primary care, identify language that allows individuals to best understand and consent to such integration, envision ways that AI-supported systems might eliminate gaps in the quality of care patients receive and enable them to be active partners in their care.

Synthesized insights and associated design principles will be delivered to the Commonwealth Fund, where they will be used primarily to inform healthcare system leaders, with secondary audiences including policymakers and AI technologists, to support ethical implementation of AI tools in primary care that serve patients’ needs.