By: DoM Communications
In this month’s Chair Spotlight, we feature Allen Chang, MD, assistant professor of medicine in the Division of General Internal Medicine and Health Systems Science, Clinical Informatics section.
Over the course of his clinical career, Dr. Chang developed an interest in technology and in implementing ways to improve the clinician experience and wellness. In doing so, he began exploring the capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI) and the ways it could positively impact medicine. At UMass Memorial Health, Dr. Chang serves as the Associate Chief Clinical Informatics Officer for AI, where he works to improve the physician and patient experience by integrating AI into everyday workflows.
Dr. Chang and his colleagues are currently exploring the benefits of DAX, an AI-powered digital assistant that records doctor-patient conversations and automatically drafts clinical notes based on those conversations. According to Dr. Chang, the tool has proven beneficial to clinicians across UMass.
“It’s been really rewarding to see a technology that we have rolled out that has really significantly impacted many clinicians,” said Dr. Chang. “I have been really eager to find solutions that meaningfully make an impact, and I think AI is one way in which I can start to see where technology can actually make our lives better as clinicians.”
Dr. Chang and his colleagues are still evaluating the effectiveness of DAX. He believes that although there are proven benefits, there are also unexpected downsides and concerns.
“I think there was a fear that patients would feel like their patient-clinician experience was being polluted by the presence of this external kind of entity that is just listening,” explained Dr. Chang. “However, it turns out that when asked about this, patients admit they are not the biggest fans of AI, but as soon as their doctor or APP starts using it, they notice their providers are looking them in the eyes for the first time in years. Patients report AI positively impacting their relationship with their clinicians.”
To date, Dr. Chang notes that the DAX scribe is primarily being used by ambulatory or outpatient clinicians but is currently being rolled out for emergency room clinicians as well.
Dr. Chang finds that the most rewarding aspects of his work come from giving patients and clinicians the tools needed to improve their lives and workflows.
“I want to concretely be able to give clinicians and patients tools where they can say, ‘My life is better because of this,’” said Dr. Chang. “We have already started to show concrete metrics with these AI tools and have been able to help certain user groups within the organization; to me, that has been the most rewarding.”
Among the more challenging aspects of his work, Dr. Chang notes that there is an organizational responsibility to teach the UMass community proper AI competencies.
“We have to think about AI responsibly and help people see that AI could better certain parts of their work,” explained Dr. Chang. “We have to think about how to overcome this increasing skepticism that people have around the promises of AI.”
Looking ahead, one of Dr. Chang’s goals is to foster a close collaboration between the clinical and academic sides of UMass to better develop AI tools that can be utilized in the clinical setting to identify and treat certain conditions more effectively.
“On the clinical side, we have a tremendous amount of data that we have amassed over our existence around patients,” said Dr. Chang. “I think we need to have the expertise to be able to leverage that data, to analyze it in a way that can allow us to apply it back to our own patients and take care of them better.”
Dr. Chang earned his medical degree from UMass Chan Medical School, where he also completed a fellowship in Clinical Informatics. He completed his Internal Medicine Residency at Massachusetts General Hospital at Harvard Medical University in Boston.
Please join us in recognizing Dr. Chang and his contributions to UMass Chan and UMass Memorial Health!