Nine in 10 patients want medical AI to have human oversight, and they are watching closely to see if health care providers will earn their trust. At the same time, they are three times more likely to trust an AI agent built into their doctor's secure portal than a public chatbot.
"Patients don't want AI to replace their doctors," said Dr. Sophia Saleem, chief health officer for Salesforce. "They want it to safely replace the waiting and the friction. When technology is built on trust, health care can finally move as fast as we do."
A Salesforce survey of more than 3,200 patients across eight countries found that patients already have decided what a better system looks like. As agentic AI, which is designed to achieve specific goals with minimal human supervision, moves deeper into care delivery, they are not opposed to it -- but they are setting specific terms. Nearly 9 in 10 say a clear path to a real person is essential.
Nearly 6 in 10 global consumers now report that they use AI to ask about their personal health. Medical providers use it to initiate clinical workflows, manage scheduling and create personalized treatment recommendations, and patient attitudes have followed. Today, 61% of global patients say they are comfortable using agentic AI in health care contexts, and nearly two-thirds would share their full medical history with AI for a faster diagnosis. A separate study found that 7 in 10 U.S. health care workers predict agentic AI will be essential to operations within five years. Although both sides of the exam room are ready, patients are specifying what ready actually means.
Patients' top concerns center on accuracy and data privacy. Thirty-six percent cite accuracy of diagnosis or treatment as their primary worry, while 30% point to the privacy and security of their health data. They also want reassurance that a real person is always within reach, and this access is a prerequisite for trust. Eighty-nine percent say a clear "escalate-to- human" option is essential for trusting AI-based administrative support, while 90% expect the same for AI medical support. Nine in 10 say patients should have the right to opt out of AI-driven clinical recommendations entirely.
"Trust and transparency are at the foundation of patient experience," said Tyler Bauer of UChicago Medicine. "We're not going to compromise on that. Patients need to know (they must know) that their information is protected and that an escalation to a live agent is always available to them."
Patients are ready to embrace agentic AI, the study concluded, but only when it is built on transparent, governed foundations with clear escalation paths, audit trails and provider-backed deployment.
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