Compile | Zheng Liyuan
Listing | CSDN（ID：CSDNnews）
Coding, translating, copywriting, writing novels... These common uses of ChatGPT have long been well known, and now someone has discovered a new usage: let ChatGPT diagnose the disease.
Courtney, a mother abroad, shared that her 4-year-old child Alex saw a total of 17 doctors in 3 years due to chronic pain, and none of them could explain the specific cause of the pain - until Courtney registered for ChatGPT and uploaded Alex's condition, finally got the correct diagnosis.
17 doctors in 3 years, unable to find the exact cause
Three years ago, during the lockdown, Courtney bought an inflatable trampoline for fear that her children would be bored at home, but it wasn't long before her son Alex started to have physical pain and had to eat Mtrin (a brand of active profen) every day to avoid losing his temper.
Later, after Alex started chewing, Courtney suspected that his molars were growing or the pain was caused by tooth decay, so he took him to the dentist. But the dentist ruled out these causes, believing that Alex might just be grinding his teeth, and referred Courtney to an orthodontist who specialized in airway obstruction—the dentist believed that airway obstruction could interfere with sleep, which could cause the child to be exhausted and moody.
After the orthodontist's examination, Alex's upper jaw was too small for his mouth and teeth, which would make it difficult for him to breathe at night, so the doctor recommended that Alex's upper jaw be fitted with an expander.
"Things seem to be getting better, everything is getting better." Courtney thought it would end there, but she later discovered that Alex hadn't grown taller for a long time, and even the development of her left and right feet seemed to be somewhat unbalanced: Alex always walked with his right foot in front and then dragged his left foot.
For this problem, Courtney took Alex to the pediatrician, who speculated that Alex's developmental problems may have been affected by the epidemic. Although Courtney disagreed, she followed the pediatrician's advice and had Alex undergo physical therapy to correct the imbalance in his left and right feet.
At the same time, Alex also had a severe headache, so Courtney took him to a neurologist again, and it turned out that Alex had migraines; It was also taken to an otolaryngologist to confirm whether Alex's frequent exhaustion was due to a sleep disturbance caused by the sinus cavity or airway.
However, neither dentistry, pediatrics, neurology, nor otolaryngology have found the true cause of Alex's symptoms such as pain and exhaustion. Courtney feels powerless: "No matter how many doctors we see, they only focus on their area of expertise, and no one wants to solve a bigger problem, or even tell us what the diagnosis is." ”
By chance, a physical therapist told Courtney that Alex may have a condition called "Chiari malformation," a congenital disorder that causes abnormalities in the brain at the junction between the skull and spine. Courtney began researching this and took Alex to see more doctors: a new pediatrician, a pediatric physician, an adult physician, and a musculoskeletonist, but it didn't work.
Courtney counted that they took Alex to 17 different doctors in the past three years, but never found a cause that could explain all his symptoms - exhausted, Courtney signed up for ChatGPT a few months ago, hoping that AI would provide some useful information.
After entering the medical information, ChatGPT finds the cause!
After successfully registering for ChatGPT, Courtney lost everything she knew about Alex's symptoms and MRI images to ChatGPT: "I looked at everything in Alex [MRI record] line by line and entered it all into ChatGPT. ”
As a result, such a seemingly unreliable way actually gave the answer: combined with the medical information entered by Courtney, ChatGPT diagnosed it as tethered spinal cord syndrome.
"This diagnosis makes a lot of sense." Knowing of this possibility, Courtney quickly went to Facebook to search for information and joined a family group of patients whose experiences sounded almost identical to Alex's.
So this time, Courtney made an appointment with a new neurosurgeon and told him directly that Alex might have tethered cord syndrome. After seeing Alex's MRI images, the doctor also confirmed her statement: Alex did have tethered spinal cord syndrome.
According to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, tethered spinal cord syndrome occurs when spinal cord tissue forms an attachment that restricts movement of the spinal cord, resulting in abnormal stretching of the spinal cord, and specific symptoms include dragging legs, body pain, scoliosis, foot or leg deformities, and staged developmental delays such as sitting up and walking. This condition is closely related to spina bifida, a congenital defect in which parts of the spinal cord are underdeveloped, resulting in part of the spinal cord and nerves being exposed.
In simple terms, tethered spinal cord syndrome is "the adhesion of the spinal cord to something." This thing could be a tumor in the spinal canal, a bulge on a bone spur, or just because there is too much fat at the end of the spinal cord. One paediatric neurosurgeon explains: "Once the abnormal area cannot be stretched... Pulling will occur. ”
Often, doctors detect these conditions soon after the baby is born, but certain markers that may indicate recessive spina bifida, such as a dimple, a red dot, or a pinch of hair, are easy to overlook—Alex is "occult" spina bifida, and because he is a toddler, it is difficult to diagnose.
Fortunately, with the reminder of ChatGPT, the pain that has been wrapped around Alex for three years has finally found its source. After being diagnosed with Tethered Cord Syndrome, Alex underwent surgery soon and has successfully entered the recovery phase. Courtney lamented that she could finally see real relief and joy on Alex's face.
Still, ChatGPT doesn't currently replace clinicians
There's no doubt that for Courtney and Alex, ChatGPT was a great success. Andrew Beam, Ph.D., assistant professor of epidemiology at Harvard University who studies machine learning models and medicine, also commented after learning about the incident: "This (ChatGPT) is a super powerful medical search engine. ”
Andrew Beam argues that ChatGPT learns the vast amount of text data available on the internet, reads the entire internet, and therefore may not have "the blind spots of human doctors." Especially for patients with complex conditions and difficult to diagnose, ChatGPT may be better than the general symptom checker or Google as a diagnostic tool.
However, Andrew Beam also stressed that ChatGPT cannot replace clinicians' expertise anytime soon, because it may "make up information" when it can't find answers. For example, someone asks ChatGPT about a study on influenza, and it will give several good-sounding titles and even list the authors, but the papers may not actually exist. "When we started talking about the use of ChatGPT in medicine, this 'hallucination' phenomenon was a big problem."
Dr. Jesse M. Ehrenfeld, president of the American Medical Association, also mentioned that while AI products show great promise in helping to reduce the burden on doctors, both ChatGPT and other generative AI products currently have limitations and safety issues, which will pose potential risks to doctors and patients and should be used with caution.
Original link: https://www.today.com/health/mom-chatgpt-diagnosis-pain-rcna101843