OpenAI integrates ChatGPT Health with Epic EHR for clinicians, enabling secure patient data access

OpenAI has announced the integration of ChatGPT Health with Epic’s electronic health record (EHR) system, which manages data for over 325 million patients, allowing clinicians to import patient data and use AI to ask questions and summarize information.

What the Epic integration offers clinicians

The integration enables clinicians to access appointment notes, laboratory results, medications, and specialist documentation, and summarize them efficiently. They can also review patient history, identify changes, and prepare for upcoming appointments. In some deployments, ChatGPT is available directly within EHR workflows, allowing pre-visit review and clinical timeline building without leaving a patient chart.

OpenAI emphasized that the integration is read-only, meaning AI does not write any information back to the health records, addressing potential safety and liability concerns.

New Healthcare Public Data plugin

OpenAI is also introducing a Healthcare Public Data plugin that fetches information from sources like ClinicalTrials.gov, CMS Coverage, RxNorm, DailyMed, and PubMed. This tool helps healthcare workers synthesize data for trial eligibility criteria, medication identifiers, coverage policy versions, and provider records.

Additionally, organizations with a Business Associate Agreement can now use ChatGPT Work, Codex, apps, and connectors in their workspace for compliant workflows, expanding the enterprise utility of the platform.

Why this matters for healthcare AI

This move comes after OpenAI rolled out ChatGPT for health to all U.S. consumers last month, with reports of 300 million health-related queries per week. Despite the deep integrations, OpenAI maintains that AI is not suitable for diagnosis or treatment. The company collected over 4,300 responses from physicians across 27 clinical use cases, finding 99.1% of responses safe. However, even a small percentage of unsafe answers can have serious consequences, as highlighted by recent lawsuits against OpenAI, including a Florida pastor who alleged ChatGPT gave a near-fatal recommendation and a May lawsuit from a user’s family over wrongful dosage advice.

Conclusion

OpenAI’s integration with Epic represents a significant step in bringing AI into clinical workflows, but it also underscores the need for careful oversight. As healthcare AI evolves, balancing innovation with patient safety remains paramount. The read-only design and public data plugins aim to enhance clinician efficiency while mitigating risks, yet the recent legal challenges serve as a reminder of the stakes involved.

FAQs

Q1: Is ChatGPT Health integration with Epic available to all clinicians?
OpenAI announced the integration, but availability may vary by healthcare organization. It is being rolled out in certain systems, with some deployments integrating ChatGPT directly within EHR workflows.

Q2: Can ChatGPT write to patient records through the Epic integration?
No, the integration is read-only. OpenAI specified that AI does not write any information back to health records, ensuring that patient data remains unchanged.

Q3: What is the Healthcare Public Data plugin?
It is a new plugin that fetches information from public sources like ClinicalTrials.gov, CMS Coverage, RxNorm, DailyMed, and PubMed, helping healthcare workers synthesize data for various clinical and administrative tasks.