AI medical conversations miss cultural differences between India and US
Building a Cultural Perspective on Doctor-Patient Conversations
Human-Computer Interaction
Summary
Doctors and patients talk differently in India and the US during medical appointments. The authors found that Indian conversations have more patient involvement but doctors keep stronger control, while US talks are more balanced and open. AI systems that create fake medical talks often make Indian conversations sound more like US ones and add extra doctor explanations and routine patient replies. This research points out the importance of considering cultural differences when making AI tools for medical conversations.
What this means in practice
- •For healthcare ai developers: Improve synthetic medical conversations by incorporating cultural interaction patterns to better match real consultations in different countries.
- •For clinical communication trainers: Design training materials that include culturally sensitive communication features identified in real doctor-patient talks from India and the US.
Authors
Krithi Shailya, Siddharth D Jaiswal, Ashish Makani, Suvrankar Datta, Sunayana Sitaram, Mohit Jain
Abstract
AI-powered medical scribes are increasingly used to transcribe doctor-patient conversations and automate clinical documentation. However, large-scale real-world consultation datasets are scarce due to the sensitivity of clinical conversations, leading developers to rely on simulated and LLM-generated synthetic consultations. While scalable, these alternatives may fail to capture culturally situated patterns of clinical interaction. We introduce interactional cultural markers, measurable patterns of doctor-patient interaction grounded in cross-cultural clinical communication, and use them to compare real, simulated, and synthetic consultations from Indian and US clinical contexts. We find distinct patterns of participation and control: Indian consultations involve greater patient participation but stronger doctor control, while US consultations exhibit balanced participation and open-ended discussion. Synthetic Indian consultations often fail to reproduce these patterns, instead converging toward US-like interaction. We identify additional synthetic signatures, including excessive doctor explanation and formulaic patient responses. We conclude by discussing implications for generating culturally grounded synthetic clinical conversations.