In a study of 158 real cases, 53% of reports written by surgeons contained inconsistencies, compared to 29% of reports generated by artificial intelligence.<br /><br />A recent study revealed that AI enables computers to observe surgeons during operations and then generate postoperative notes that are more accurate than those written by the doctors themselves.<br /><br />The researchers, in a report published in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons, noted that writing surgical notes—reports that document the details of a surgical procedure—is tedious and often contains inaccurate or incomplete information.<br /><br />The researchers wrote in the report: “Surgical reports not only facilitate communication among healthcare providers but also serve as a foundation for diagnosis, medical testing, and treatment. They are used to calibrate surgical quality, support surgical research efforts, and track compliance with regulatory requirements and evidence-based guidelines.” They added, “Arguably, they are the most important document in all of surgery.”<br /><br />Using artificial intelligence, the researchers trained computer vision systems to recognize surgeons’ actions in video recordings of robot-assisted procedures for lymph node removal. For every possible step in the procedure, such as removing lymph nodes or tying blood vessels, the researchers pre-wrote a descriptive text. As the AI system “watched” the recorded video, it identified the surgeon’s steps and compiled the text into a narrative surgical report.<br /><br />When the researchers tested the system using video recordings of 158 real cases, 53% of reports written by surgeons contained inconsistencies, compared to 29% of AI-generated reports, as determined by a team of expert reviewers.<br /><br />Significant inconsistencies with the recorded procedures, which could be crucial for patient care, were found in 27% of surgeons’ reports and only 13% of AI-generated reports.<br /><br />The researchers stated that with further testing, the new technology has the potential to “reduce the documentation burden, improve the accuracy of surgical reports, enhance surgical transparency, and reduce bias in surgical documentation.”<br /><br />"AL_mustaqbal University is the first university in Iraq"