Indian Medical Council Updates Professional Regulations to Limit AI in Consultations

On May 12, 2020, the Indian Medical Council updated its Professional Regulations, the “Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquette and Ethics) (Amendment) Regulations, 2020.” The guidelines also include an update on telemedicine, as per clause 5. It regulates “registered medical practitioners” who use technology to communicate with patients. The guidelines require any telemedicine to patients are only communicating with registered medical practitioners, taking due diligence to ensure compliance with all of the regulations.

However, in addition to that it contains a specific reference to artificial intelligence:

Technology platforms based on Artificial Intelligence/Machine Learning are not allowed to counsel the patients or prescribing medicine to a patient. Only a [Registered Medical Practitioner] is entitled to counsel or prescribe and has to directly communicate with the patient in this regard. While new technology such as Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, advanced data science based decision support systems etc. could assist and support a [Registered Medical Practitioner]…, the final prescription or counseling has to be directly delivered by the [Practitioner]

The regulations require medical practitioners to provide the prescription themselves, although it does allow for technology to assist in the decision-making.