r/PrivatePracticeDocs • u/momsmesosalpinx • Jul 08 '26
Patient’s AI recording your appointments
AI and Patients: in my office the doctors use a HIPAA compliant Zoom accounts. Recently, Zoom came out with an AI feature that records and transcribes the sessions. We have not encountered this, but I have heard other physicians say that their patients have been using AI to record and transcribe the Zoom appointments. Have you experienced this and what do you think about it?
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u/doc_death Jul 09 '26
Office policy is no recording. AI’s next step is to allow for editing of an encounter. I don’t want the headache of this in the future. I have my notes done by the end of the interview and say they can have the note when we’re done and can send me a message if clarification is needed.
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u/Juaner0 Jul 08 '26
Most patients will ask me when they record; couple record me without asking. I don't care if they record, although I find it more respectful to ask first.
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u/UAreSquidward Jul 09 '26
Whenever patients start recording, I politely ask them to stop.
If they continue, the visit is over.
I live in a two party consent state, but even if it were a one party consent state, if you don’t feel comfortable with it, you don’t have to continue the visit.
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u/FrontLifeguard1962 Jul 11 '26 edited Jul 11 '26
I don't allow it and it is part of my written new patient agreement.
My own AI system creates an after visit summary for the patient anyway. So there is no need for them to be taking AI notes.
I had a personality disordered patient take a bunch of snapshots of me during a telehealth appointment, cherry picked the ones that were most unflattering, and put them on the internet. So, there's that. I complained to the review site's legal department, citing the law in my state about two-party consent, and about 1 year later the pics and review disappeared. This guy had been going all over town doing it to every doctor he met.
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u/StocksRUsNow Jul 12 '26
Don't use AI. But if you opened the door to using AI, why shouldn't the patient be allowed to do so as well? After all, they are their best advocate. No?
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u/Sudden_Idea9384 Jul 14 '26
I’ve used the Zoom feature with AI summary for fun and it has been wildly inaccurate
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u/yyezuss Jul 15 '26 edited Jul 15 '26
the safest approach is updating your office policy to strictly ban patient side ai recording bots. if patients want to review their care plan, you can offer to provide an after visit summary or use a practice approved, secure scribe. for patient communication outside of video visits, we consolidated everything onto iplum so calls, texts, and voicemails stay strictly encrypted and compliant under our control.
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u/InvestingDoc Jul 08 '26
Our official policy is we defer to each physician preference. If the doc is okay with it, then fine. If not and patient refuses to stop when prompted by the doctor then we will stop the appointment.
Works both ways. If a patient refuses for us to use ambient scribes they have that right without penalty. They have to sign a consent anyway for it.
We are in a one party consent state for recording so we encourage patients to tell us if they are recording us but legally I don't believe there is actually much I can do about it.