MeTime Healing’s Post

Transcript

Second part I'm going to come to after we talk about AI, it's what is the benefit of like having a licensed professional at your fingertips as opposed to the AI? Because I see a lot of the online solutions out there offering AI even for our students, you know, like in our school districts, they're using some of those programs where. DF student is or if a child, a young person is feeling a certain way then they go to this app and they can enter information and communicate virtually with. Are you an Artificial Intelligence? What are your thoughts around that? Are there benefits? Are there drawbacks? What is your experience being a professional in the field? Yeah. And and I think greatly they think when we talk about like the shortage of providers, you can see how naturally someone they think AI is a solution, right? Like, OK, let's just take the person out of this, right, and just program a bot to do, do what we do, right. A lot of therapy can be somewhat protocol driven things like cognitive behavioral therapy, you know, dialectical behavioral therapy. Some of the SO so I, I, you know, want to be open minded about it as a solution to the shortage of providers. At the same time, you know when we when a therapist does cognitive behavioral therapy, that is evidence based. There have been. Thousands of studies that have showed a provider doing this works. That data isn't there for AI. And part of what you see when you compare different types of psychotherapies, it's like there's something that we call like the common factors in therapy, which is kind of the human connection and a lot of like the evidence has shown, like that's really what works. And therapy like of course, like big reexamining your thoughts and reframing them and of course those things help. And there's a lot about the human connection that really makes therapy work. And. And you're losing that with an AI, right? Like, they're like, maybe they can give you some canned answer. This seems like human connection, but it's not genuine human connection. Yeah, I also read a little bit about, you know, just being a little wary with AI sometimes actually making things like eating disorders worse. Like people can based on the prompts they put in. A I can actually give you some questions on how to, like, restrict calories or how to like. Ohh my further along and eating disorder which is really scary. It's you know, I I think this technology is still very new. And so I just, you know want to be very, very like especially young adults are going on this and might not have like the executive function to say like wait, I don't think this is actually being helpful. This might be making things a little worse. So it that like that scares me with with AI when we start talking about mental health. And then the other thing, kind of going back to the social piece, part of what I think is driving anxiety and depression is a lack of social connection. And I I think that again, like part of what you're going to learn in therapy is sometimes even just modeling normal social connection. Like sometimes I make patients call my office because they're so scared of calling. I'm like you're going to call my front desk and make an appointment. I can make it for you online, but I'm not going to do that because I want you to learn this skill and and we're going to. Do things to Foster. Learning how to be more social and and again I kind of doing the opposite. So it just it it it really scares me. Yeah. Yeah. I think, you know, there's definitely benefits to the anonymity again, the accessibility, right. And for this particular generation of young people and young women, you know, maybe it's a good starting place. But oftentimes I feel like, I mean I use artificial intelligence and in my work. Quite frequently, but I've always vetting it. You know, I'm always going through and when you just have like. You know consumer Direct Line to the consumer Direct Line to the patient, there's nothing to to vet that and it oftentimes I think feels like the wild, Wild West out there. You know everybody is is accessing information but we can't. We can't bet that you know we can't. We can't qualify the advice really interesting about the the eating disorders. You know, I I know that's. Here we are in 2024 and we're, you know in in some of these things are still problematic for. Our young people and our young women. And it's so discouraging. Umm, that's It's frightening, actually, to hear that. Like it could exacerbate. An issue like that in particular, and possibly others, I know that some of the platforms I personally have used use AI, you know, to to communicate. I I haven't personally engaged with it just because. I I have a preference, you know, it's maybe it's my age, but I have a preference. About, you know, having that human connection. I think about our young people, though, and that's a really great point, Dr. Chanani, that you know, they they might. They might feel very comfortable with the AI, are very comfortable, you know, never even having a conversation, and I mean for the betterment of our world, giving them as many opportunities as possible to connect. Within a human, I think is is super important. There was something that. You had mentioned about. Umm. Now I'm losing my train of thought because I'm just back in that, you know, in that AI space, ohh the importance of. Of not just as human, but you believe that there is. An importance in meeting with a professional or a clinical. Professional as opposed to, you know, there's the argument of like, who needs a therapist when I've got all my girlfriends and we go have coffee together on Sunday. So, you know, so is there a benefit, Do you believe there's a benefit to speaking with a clinical professional as opposed to hanging out with your girlfriends, you know, and having that human connection, which is valuable and I'm sure What are your thoughts? And. But both are valuable, right? Like, I think like you, you need robust social connections and sometimes. Yeah, like. Venting to your friends is great. What is good about seeing like a a professional race trained, clinical professional Is 1 their objective right? They are not going to be scared to say something that's going to hurt your feelings or right, because that that's their job and. Know how to do it in a way that will. Still, be mindful of like your your software and your self esteem. But they're trained in how to do these things and how to help people make change. Right when you're coming to see a therapist, often you're looking to change something and a friend is going to be really great and supporting you and validating what you're doing. A professional is probably going to be better at helping you actually make a change. And then I think they just have again the training, the experience of how to do this in a way that will work and and so I think that's that's just what's so beneficial and again, right again. That fact, the AI stuff, it doesn't discount online services because there are online services that use actual people and use actual claim. Professionals, right. And so, so just looking at when you are signing up for like an online service, what who they're using to provide the therapy? Umm. I was thinking about this as you were talking the importance of a clinical professional and we had talked about cost, right? Like earlier in our discussion and the difference between again like do I get my 2 hour massage or do I go speak to my therapist who I have a good relationship?