An Analysis of the Attitudes of Students, Radiology Residents and Radiology Physicians Towards Artificial Intelligence in Radiology

Introduction Radiology is an important part of the healthcare system, enabling the diagnosis of a wide range of diseases (1). The rapid application of artificial intelligence (AI) in radiology may become a tool that will influence the radiology specialty in daily practice (2). Observing the increasing use of AI in the specialty of radiology, we conducted a study to investigate the impact of AI on the attitudes of medical students, radiology residents and radiologists about the future prospects of AI in the specialty of radiology. Aim To investigate the attitudes of medical students, radiology residents and radiology physicians towards the impact of AI on the future of radiology. Methods Data were collected in a prospective study using an original questionnaire. Data analysis was performed using the IBM SPSS Satistics 29.0 statistical package. Statistically significant difference is considered when p ≤ 0.05. Results The analysis included 182 respondents, including 98 students, 33 radiology residents and 51 radiologists. There were 122 women and 60 men. The study found a statistically significant association (p=0.016) between students' gender and attitudes towards the influence of AI on choices in radiology. Women were more likely to deny (84.9%) the influence of AI development on their choice of specialty than men (15.1%), who admitted that AI has a greater influence on their choice of radiology specialty. We also found a statistically significant (p=0.05) correlation between the perceived impact of AI development in radiology on students' future specialty choice. In the question about the impact of AI on the future of the radiology specialty, one of the most frequent choices made by radiology residents was that AI will facilitate the work of radiologists (91.2%). Other options, such as AI will reduce the likelihood of errors in radiology and AI will change the way radiologists work, were also chosen by 76.5% and 41.2% of radiology residents respectively. When comparing the answers of radiology residents and radiologists, the option that AI will facilitate the work of radiologists was chosen by 20.6% less by radiologists. As a multiple-choice option, this option was chosen by 70.6% of radiologists. Also, a lower proportion of radiologists (68.6%) compared to residents (76.5%) indicated that AI will reduce the likelihood of errors, and almost half of radiologists (49%) believe that AI will change the way radiologists work in future. Conclusions Overall, it can be stated that the integration of AI in radiology has a significant impact on all groups of respondents in the study. The responses of the group of medical students showed that the integration of AI in radiology will have an important impact on the future choice of radiology specialty. Respondent groups of residents and physicians who have already chosen radiology stressed that the integration of AI in radiology will facilitate clinical work and reduce the likelihood of errors.