OpenAI's ChatGPT Health: Changing the Face of Patient Care?

Health and wellness are among the primary reasons people use artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots.

According to OpenAI, more than 230 million users ask health-related questions weekly.

The company has now launched ChatGPT Health, a feature integrating personal medical information with artificial intelligence support.

This tool introduces additional protections for sensitive medical data while remaining accessible.

OpenAI stresses the service is intended to work alongside professional medical advice rather than replacing it.

Developed with physicians, it offers encrypted environments to link wellness app data or medical records.

This launch coincides with broader industry shifts. Rival firm Anthropic recently launched Claude for Healthcare, highlighting growing competition in healthtech.

Managing data in a dedicated space

Medical information often exists across disparate portals and wearables. ChatGPT Health acts as a unified space where wellness insights and medical data coexist.

This data remains strictly separated from general chatbot interactions to ensure privacy.

Health conversations are stored within dedicated memories. If a medical topic is raised in a general chat, the system may suggest moving to the Health section. This ensures stronger data protections for sensitive information.

Users can integrate external data by connecting services such as MyFitnessPal or Apple Health. In the US, connection to electronic medical records is facilitated through b.well. Users maintain the right to revoke access to their records through settings at any time.

Security systems and physician collaboration

The platform uses encrypted data transmission and system isolation. OpenAI has made it clear that health-related conversations are never used to train its foundation models. This ensures personal data remains private and secure.

Users retain control through features like temporary chats and the ability to delete specific memories. Multi-factor authentication adds an extra barrier against unauthorised access.

Third-party applications must pass rigorous security reviews and collect only essential data.

The product was informed by significant medical consultation. OpenAI worked with over 260 physicians across 60 countries over two years.

This group reviewed more than 600,000 responses to guide how the AI signals urgency and safety concerns.

Industry response to automated triage

The introduction of ChatGPT Health has seen various reactions.

Max Jones, Chief AI Officer at RPNA and a Non-Executive Director in the UK's NHS, emphasised that the platform "comes with real risks", but said the public had to think carefully about decisions concerning their health. 

Writing on LinkedIn, he added: "The power rests not with clinicians, legislators or regulators; rather, the power is in the hands of the public through the decisions they take when confronted with a health uncertainty. Should they wait for authoritative human care or seek more immediate guidance from an LLM?

"Until the NHS recovers its service performance and public confidence, I suspect we will see the public drive LLM-based triage whether the professionals like it or not."

Ben Legg, Co-Founder and CEO of The Portfolio Collective, comments: "We are moving from using AI as a secretive second opinion to a primary triage tool. In the future, before you see a human, an agent will likely review your medical history, analyse your wearables data and summarise your symptoms for the consultant.

"This offers incredible efficiency and could solve the GP appointment backlog crisis overnight. But it fundamentally changes the patient-doctor relationship."

ChatGPT Health is initially being rolled out to a limited number of users with Free, Go, Plus or Pro plans, excluding those in the European Economic Area, Switzerland and the UK. Medical record and app integration features are currently available only in the US, while Apple Health integration requires iOS.