One in seven Brits swapped their GP for ChatGPT, study finds
A recent study reveals that one in seven people in the UK have opted for AI chatbots like ChatGPT instead of consulting their GP for medical advice. The primary reasons for this shift include convenience and curiosity, with many users unsure about the seriousness of their symptoms. However, concerns about the safety and accuracy of AI in healthcare remain prevalent among the public, with a notable divide in opinions on its role in clinical decision-making.
- ▪One in seven Brits have used AI instead of contacting a doctor.
- ▪46 percent cited convenience as their reason for using chatbots for medical advice.
- ▪Public confidence in AI healthcare is divided, with 37 percent supporting its use and 38 percent opposing it.
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| Original publisher | The Register |
| Canonical URL | https://www.theregister.com/ai-ml/2026/05/16/one-in-seven-brits-swapped-their-gp-for-chatgpt-study-finds/5240514 |
| Publication time | Sat, 16 May 2026 10:33:00 +0200 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-05-16T08:35:17.835Z |
| Last seen | 2026-05-16T08:35:17.835Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | 2f2JQ4DNouJV |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
(function() { let windowUrl = window.location.href; windowUrl = windowUrl.substring(windowUrl.indexOf('?') + 1); let messageElement = document.querySelector('.shareableMessage'); if (windowUrl && windowUrl.includes('code') && windowUrl.includes('expires')) { messageElement.style.display = 'block'; } })(); AI + ML One in seven Brits swapped their GP for ChatGPT, study finds Patients are using chatbots for medical advice, while the NHS is still debating where AI belongs Carly Page Carly Page Published sat 16 May 2026 // 09:33 UTC Brits are now asking chatbots about mysterious lumps and weird rashes instead of calling their GP, which is probably not the digital healthcare revolution anybody meant to build.A new study from King's College London found that one in seven people in the UK have…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at The Register.
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