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The poll found 57% of staff agreed with the statement compared to 17% disagreeing and when broken down by staffing groups, AI had the most support in the medical and dental sector, with 67% agreeing with the statement.
It was commissioned by the Health Foundation and looked at what the public and NHS staff think about the use of AI in healthcare. It surveyed 7,201 members of the public and 1,292 NHS staff between June and July this year.
It also found support for the use of AI for patient care – including diagnosing illness and recommending treatment – was higher amongst NHS staff than the public.
Over half of the UK public (54%) and three-quarters of NHS staff surveyed (76%) stated they were in favour of its use for patient care.
Support for AI for administrative use by both groups was even higher.
Of 10 options presented, the main advantage of AI selected most often by both the public (31%) and NHS staff (32%) was ‘helping health care staff with admin’, and 61% of the public and 81% of NHS staff agreed using AI for administrative purposes would be a good thing.
However the Health Foundation pointed out a “significant minority” is currently not in support of using AI, with around one in 10 of NHS staff responding it will make care quality worse.
One area of concern is AI’s potential impact on the social and relational aspects of health care, the foundation said.
Nearly two-thirds of the NHS staff surveyed (65%) think AI will make them feel more distant from patients and the fact that ‘AI systems can’t show real empathy or kindness’ was the most selected disadvantage of AI among the NHS staff surveyed (selected by 27%).
The Health Foundation suggests the findings show AI technologies will need to be “designed and used in ways that protect or even enhance the human dimension of care”.
The concerns raised in the survey could be one explanation as to why both NHS staff and the public seem more receptive to the use of AI for administrative work over patient care.
Researchers also suggest help needs to be given to healthcare workers to “adjust to the rise of AI” and consideration should be given as to how its impact will vary across different roles.
