麻省总医院布莱根医院使用的人工智能聊天机器人已获得数千个预约
【中美创新时报2026年5月11日讯】（记者温友平编译）自麻省总医院布莱根医院推出人工智能驱动的平台，将需要初级保健的人们与远程医疗医生联系起来以来的八个月里，患者已经进行了超过 14,000 次虚拟预约。《波士顿环球报》记者乔纳森·萨尔茨曼对此作了下述报道。
该平台最初于9月推出时名为Care Connect，其特色在于一个聊天机器人，该机器人会询问 患者一些问题，然后在短短半小时内安排患者与医生进行远程医疗预约。MGB是全美首批推出该应用程序的医疗系统之一。
该平台最初是为找不到家庭医生的患者设计的。今年2月，MGB扩大了其服务范围，将那些可能已有家庭医生但需要紧急远程医疗服务的患者也纳入其中，包括在医生诊所关门期间。MGB放弃了“Care Connect”这个名称，并将服务更名为“24/7 Virtual Care”。
“这只是为了更好地描述这项服务，”负责数字化患者体验的副总裁拉杰什·帕特尔博士说。“我们对收到的患者反馈感到满意。”
帕特尔表示，到目前为止，患者已经预约了 14524 次。
其中包括52岁的米德尔顿居民玛格达拉·埃斯特凡，她上个月持续咳嗽、全身酸痛，感觉身体不适，无法前往位于贝弗利的MGB诊所就诊。她说，她早上7点打开了这款应用程序，一个小时后就与医生进行了远程医疗预约。
“尽管是线上问诊，但我从他那里得到的照顾真的非常出色，”埃斯特凡说道。她是一家面向公立和私立学校的外语强化项目的创始人和负责人。她说，医生道格拉斯·坎贝尔博士向她保证，她的症状是由一种正在流行的病毒引起的，并给她开了药，大约一周后她就感觉好多了。
这款应用是MGB与纽约人工智能公司K Health合作的成果。K Health曾为多家面临全科医生短缺的大型医疗机构搭建过类似的数字化平台，其中包括洛杉矶的西达-赛奈医疗中心和明尼苏达州罗切斯特的梅奥诊所。
MGB推出该平台时曾表示，由于全国范围内医疗服务提供者短缺，其医疗系统中有15000名患者缺乏固定的家庭医生。然而，据《环球报》获得的一份幻灯片副本显示，MGB高管最近向员工展示的一份幻灯片显示，该医疗系统中已有超过30000名患者没有家庭医生。
MGB 发言人杰西卡·帕斯托雷表示，没有初级保健提供者的患者人数并没有增加；相反，医疗保健系统最初只是向有限数量的患者推出了该平台，现在已将其提供给更多患者。
该医疗保健系统的几位初级保健医生表示，该平台分散了人们对真正解决 MGB 此类医生短缺问题的注意力：提供能够吸引更多初级保健医生并防止他们离开的薪酬和工作条件。
“我认为他们与其关注权宜之计，不如投资基层医疗，”自2008年以来一直在麻省总医院担任基层医生的克里斯汀·冈宁博士说。“人工智能聊天机器人不是基层医疗。它可以帮助续开处方，但它不能取代医生。”
一年前，MGB的初级保健医生以183票赞成、26票反对的投票结果，决定加入服务业雇员国际工会（SEIU）的医生委员会。这是马萨诸塞州初级保健医生首次投票组建自己的谈判单位。MGB已就该工会分会的组成向美国国家劳工关系委员会提出质疑，并拒绝与员工进行合同谈判。
MGB高级医疗总监海伦·爱尔兰博士曾参与启动Care Connect项目，她在秋季表示，该医疗系统一直致力于招募全科医生。MGB称，在过去两年里，他们已经聘请了110多名全科医生来填补空缺。
题图：麻省总医院布里格姆医疗中心位于萨默维尔的办公室。莱恩·特纳/《波士顿环球报》工作人员
附原英文报道：
An AI chatbot used by Mass General Brigham is getting thousands of appointments
By Jonathan Saltzman Globe Staff,Updated May 9, 2026
The Mass General Brigham offices in Somerville.Lane Turner/Globe Staff
Patients have made over 14,000 virtual appointments in the eight months since Mass General Brigham launched its AI-powered platform to connect people who need primary care with telehealth physicians.
The platform, originally called Care Connect when it debuted in September, features a chatbot that questions the patient, then sets up a telehealth appointment with a physician in as little as half an hour. MGB is among the first health systems nationally to roll out the app.
The platform was originally designed for patients who couldn’t find primary care physicians. In February, MGB expanded its use to include patients who might have a primary care provider but want urgent virtual care, including at times when their doctor’s office is closed. MGB ditched the name Care Connect and rebranded the service “24/7 Virtual Care.”
“It was simply to describe the service better,” said Dr. Rajesh Patel, vice president of digital patient experience. “We’re happy with the feedback we’re getting from patients.”
So far, patients have set up 14,524 appointments, Patel said.
They include Magdala Estephan, a 52-year-old Middleton resident who had a persistent cough and body aches last month and felt too sick to see her primary care physician at an MGB practice in Beverly. She said she went on the app at 7 a.m. and had a telehealth appointment with a doctor an hour later.
“Despite being virtual, the level of care I received from him was really exceptional,” said Estephan, the founder and head of a foreign language enrichment program for public and private schools. She said the physician, Dr. Douglas Campbell, assured her that her symptoms stemmed from a virus that was going around and prescribed medicine that made her feel better in about a week.
The app represents a partnership between MGB and K Health, a New York AI firm. K Health has set up similar digital platforms for several large health systems facing shortages of primary care doctors, including Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles and Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.
When MGB launched the platform, it said the health care system had 15,000 patients who lacked a regular primary care doctor because of a nationwide shortage of such providers. Recently, however, MGB executives shared a slide deck with employees showing that there are more than 30,000 patients in the health system without a primary care provider, according to a copy of a slide obtained by the Globe.
Jessica Pastore, an MGB spokesperson, said that the number of patients without a primary care provider hadn’t grown; rather the health care system initially rolled out the platform to a limited number of patients and has now made it available to more of them.
Several primary care doctors at the health care system described the platform as a distraction from what they contend is the real solution to the shortage of such physicians at MGB: providing the pay and working conditions that will attract more primary care physicians and keep them from leaving.
“Instead of focusing on Band-Aid solutions, I think they should be investing in primary care,” said Dr. Kristen Gunning, a primary care physician at a Massachusetts General Hospital practice since 2008. “An AI chatbot is not primary care. It can help with the refill of a prescription, but it is not a replacement.”
A year ago, primary care doctors at MGB voted 183-26 to join the Doctors Council of the Service Employees International Union. It was the first time that primary care doctors in Massachusetts had voted to form their own bargaining unit. MGB has challenged the makeup of the union chapter to the National Labor Relations Board and refused to negotiate a contract with the employees.
Dr. Helen Ireland, a senior medical director at MGB who helped launch Care Connect, said in the fall that the health system has worked hard to recruit primary care physicians. In the prior two years, MGB said, it has hired more than 110 such doctors to help fill vacancies.
