Using AI to diagnose your pet? Tread carefully
AI tools like ChatGPT have become a go-to for…pretty much everything. But when it comes to questions about your pet’s health, is AI the best answer?
AI tools can answer all sorts of questions, help you compose emails, and even help you generate photos or videos of events that never happened. Generative AI, in that sense, has been a wild, fun development. But there are some serious concerns you should have when it comes to using it as a self-diagnostic tool—for you, or others. That includes your pets.
Yes, you can use AI to ask questions about your pets’ health. That can help you get some quick answers, and in some instances, maybe better answers than you’d source from a standard search engine. And yes, veterinary practices are utilizing AI tools in some capacities to help their teams diagnose animals with certain health problems. But these are different types of tools, and different types of AI.
So, while most of us have the power of AI tools and chatbots at our fingertips these days, it may be okay—or even standard practice, for some people—to use them as an initial way to get answers about our pets’ health. For example, if your dog has a cough, or your cat has a goopy eye, you may want to use one of those chatbots to get some answers as to possible reasons that those issues are occurring.
But beyond that? You should still rely on an expert, human hand. That’s because AI tools can hallucinate, they can source wrong or incorrect information, and they’re also designed for a broad audience. That is, they don’t know the specifics of each individual situation, and will give unspecific answers to broad questions.
For instance, the prompt “Why does my dog have a cough?” could generate a ton of different answers. Probably too many answers, in fact. But if you were to ask your vet? They could take into account the fact that you live in a certain area or environment, that your dog has known allergies or is on certain medications, and other factors that an AI tool simply can’t.
Again, this isn’t to say that these tools aren’t worth their salt, or that they can’t be a good tool to do some initial legwork or get some early answers. We all do that, and have, Googling our medical symptoms and trying to figure out what’s wrong, saving ourselves a trip to the doctor.
But it bears repeating: The AI tool doesn’t know the full story, and can’t give a hands-on, comprehensive evaluation.
A study published in 2024 in the journal Veterinary Medicine and Science bears this out, concluding that a “balanced approach” to using AI to diagnose our pets’ health problems is likely to lead to the best outcomes.
“…Concerns arise regarding pet owners relying solely on AI chatbots for medical advice, potentially resulting in misdiagnosis, inappropriate treatment and delayed professional intervention….We emphasize the need for a balanced approach, positioning AI chatbots as supplementary tools rather than substitutes for licensed veterinarians,” the study says.
“While AI chatbots hold immense promise in transforming pet health care, cautious and informed usage is crucial. By promoting awareness, establishing regulations and fostering collaboration, the article advocates for a responsible integration of AI chatbots to ensure optimal care for pets.”
To sum it up? Knock yourself out with AI tools, but don’t rely solely on them for important medical or health advice. That’s what we’re here for!
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