Evaluating the Effectiveness of an AI-Powered Physician Assistant in Improving Patients' and Physicians' Satisfaction in Anaesthesiology Clinics

This trial aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of an AI-Powered Physician Assistant in improving patients' satisfaction with the quality of care. It also aims to evaluate physicians' satisfaction with the integration of a Physician Assistant into their clinical workflows. The primary research question is A. What is the effect of an AI-powered Physician Assistant on patients' satisfaction with their quality of care compared to the standard care? The secondary questions are as follows: B1. How satisfied are physicians with integrating an AI-powered physician assistant into their daily clinical workflows? B2. Which factors are significantly associated with patient satisfaction regarding the AI-Powered Physician Assistant? B3. Is there a statistically significant difference in mean consultation time per patient between those receiving AI-assisted care and those receiving only standard of careonly ? Participants will be enrolled from pre-operative outpatient clinics, including patients attending clinic for anaesthetic clearance prior to surgery and consultant anaesthetists providing care. Patients will serve as the unit of randomization and will be assigned to one of two study arms on each clinic day. On each clinic day, the first 8 eligible patients presenting for consultation will be randomly assigned to the intervention group or the control group in a 1:1 ratio. Intervention patients will proceed to a dedicated waiting room for structured digital intake via an AI platform (demographics, symptoms, history, clinical data) and receive AI-assisted care. Control group patients will undergo routine standard care protocols. The consultant physician will evaluate both arms during each clinic session, reviewing physician assistant-generated patient summaries and charts for patients in both the intervention and control groups. Each patient will be asked to fill out the survey at the end of the consultation with the physician. The consultants will be requested to fill out a survey at the end of the day.

Patients and Patients' Proxies Inclusion Criteria: * Consent to participate * Age 18 years and above * Initial patients * Possession of a phone * Read and write Urdu and/or English Exclusion Criteria: * Emergency Care patients * Follow-up patients Physicians: Inclusion Criteria * Attending or Consultant Physician * Consent to participate * Workflow integrated with AI Assistant Exclusion Criteria \- Residents and Senior Medical Officers