Even saying AI right now seems like a risk. Between the boosters and the doomers there's probably a reality, but none of us are quite sure where it lies. Or how to get there.

Though there are some super interesting experiments going on in the health space right now. At one end we have Mid-Journeys move into ultrasound full-body scans that basically use an AI to fill in the blanks between ultrasound scans. Somehow (allegedly) getting from you in a bath to a full health scan in 60 seconds. 

Then we have experiments at the other end of the scale like this one, which are much more actionable by you (we're assuming you don't own a frontier AI company here, sorry if you do).

LLMs have many advantages, one of which is spotting long term trends in huge quantities of data. This person used it to log all the inputs, habits and lifestyle choices she made to find trends and triggers underlying a chronic fatigue issue. But the interesting part is that you could use it for myriad other issues.

The point she makes about GPs and doctors getting 11 seconds of information from you at consultation before interruption is no doubt correct. There's also the issue that they only get what you tell them, which is often only the good bits. So you turn up, do your best to remember what happened in a way that doesn't compromise your self image and get some prescription. You try it, wait a while, go back and repeat. It's a lossy and subjective loop.

What the writer did was close that loop. Imperfectly, with a lot of effort, and in circumstances most of us won't face. But the method is the point. Log everything. Feed it to something patient enough to look and with the capacity to spot the trends. See what emerges. 

It's an interesting read and an early sign of the direction these LLMs will enable in healthcare. We're right to worry about the space that AI is putting between our intuition and reality but in some cases, like this one, that seems to be a good thing.

Full article here, the comments are also worth a skim.

And just to be clear. DO NOT replace your doctor with an AI... Replace your scrappy, if existent, data logging with an AI and take it to your doctor to support better decisions.