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In contrast to previous tech-fueled "revolutions" in health care, experts say the current AI-fueled transformation of the sector is under-hyped.

Why it matters: Investors are already pouring hundreds of millions into startups like Abridge and Commure. 

What they're saying: "Every time a technology has come into my career, it's been exciting, but this is definitely different," Google chief health officer Karen DeSalvo said. "Plenty of people say it is actually under-hyped, and I think it is."

Mayo Clinic chief AI implementation officer Micky Tripathi agreed, saying, "I think in some ways, it is under-hyped."

"We always overestimate the power of a new technology and what's going to do in five years, and totally underestimate its power in 10 years. In this case, it's like three years and five years," Tripathi added.

Context: Executives from Google, Mayo Clinic, and Duke University spoke on an Axios-moderated panel at the Aspen Ideas Health Festival on Tuesday.

The big picture: Clinicians are taking insights from ChatGPT — both those brought in by patients and used by the doctor themselves — more seriously than information previously sourced from the internet.

Case in point: "We've all used Doctor Google, but this is different," said Nita Farahany, founding director of the Duke Initiative for Science and Society.

"It's personalized, it's tailored. It's not your doctor, but you turn to it for a problem, and it democratizes and gives access to health care and information and interpretability to so many more people," Farahany added.

Inside the room: Physicians and researchers are experimenting with the tools daily to inform potential diagnoses and fuel new life science R&D.

"I think a lot of physicians are taking these [LLM tools] pretty seriously," said Farahany.

Tripathy cited a case where a close friend — renowned UCSF institute director Atul Butte, used ChatGPT to research potential diagnoses for himself.  One diagnosis turned out to be accurate, and Butte used the tool to inform his conversation with his doctors. 

"One of his specialists thought, 'I should just treat this as a hypothesis and explore further.' Turned out to be a very rare form of brain tumor that got diagnosed early," Tripathi said.

"It used to be that you train a model to read a mammogram, and it could learn to be quite good at it and be helpful in the clinical environment," DeSalvo said. 

"But now the model is multipurpose. It has abilities that are multimodal. It can see and hear and talk and see images, and it's so capable so quickly."

Follow the money: One concern for Mayo Clinic around LLM use is ballooning costs due to a lack of mechanism to bill insurers.

"Some of these models are very intensive. You roll them out, and you're seeing 200,000 requests from nurses every week, and then every single query against the model is a penny, but all of a sudden you're at $300,000 or $400,000 a month, and there's no separate line item that you can bill the insurer," said Tripathi.

"We need to be able to have line of sight to whether we can afford these things as we move forward," he added.

Friction point: The technology's pervasiveness and evolving ability to integrate with the health care system raises concerns about data privacy and algorithmic bias.

These tools present "a whole host of new, complicated questions around privacy, bias and confidence, and about how doctors are consulting with them," said Farahany.

"The short answer is, it's the wild west," when it comes to regulation, Farahany added.

What's next: Google has been trying to regulate models by treating them like physicians and licensing them, "as if they had gone through training, passed the requisite exams, and there was a way to do continuous medical evaluation of them," said DeSalvo.

"It's an idea," she added. "We also need to think about other ways to make sure that these tools can become part of health teams sooner so they can help more people."

AI in health is under-hyped, tech and hospital execs say at Aspen

Generative AI is driving more creative research and more efficient hospital administration.

Speakers at the Aspen Health Ideas festival

From left to right: Axios' Erin Brodwin, Google chief health officer Karen DeSalvo, Mayo Clinic chief AI officer Micky Tripathi, and Duke Institute founder Nina Farahany. Photo credit: Tiffany Santini

In contrast to previous tech-fueled &quot;revolutions&quot; in health care, experts say the current AI-fueled transformation of the sector is under-hyped.Why it matters: Investors are <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="already pouring hundreds of millions" data-vars-click-url="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/25/abridge-300m-fundraise-ceo-rcm-biling-scribe" data-vars-content-id="3b3e96e2-5551-4ee2-9355-3d7f201b1bd4" data-vars-headline="AI in health is under-hyped, tech and hospital execs say at Aspen" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/25/abridge-300m-fundraise-ceo-rcm-biling-scribe" target="_self">already pouring hundreds of millions</a> into startups like <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="Abridge" data-vars-click-url="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/24/abridge-raise-300m-5b-valuation-billing-scribe" data-vars-content-id="3b3e96e2-5551-4ee2-9355-3d7f201b1bd4" data-vars-headline="AI in health is under-hyped, tech and hospital execs say at Aspen" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/24/abridge-raise-300m-5b-valuation-billing-scribe" target="_self">Abridge</a> and <a class="gtmContentClick" data-vars-link-text="Commure" data-vars-click-url="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/19/commure-200-million-general-catalyst" data-vars-content-id="3b3e96e2-5551-4ee2-9355-3d7f201b1bd4" data-vars-headline="AI in health is under-hyped, tech and hospital execs say at Aspen" data-vars-event-category="story" data-vars-sub-category="story" data-vars-item="in_content_link" href="https://www.axios.com/pro/health-tech-deals/2025/06/19/commure-200-million-general-catalyst" target="_self">Commure</a>.

AI in health is under-hyped, tech and hospital execs say at Aspen

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