Artificial intelligence in healthcare: a qualitative study exploring consumer perspectives

Artificial intelligence (AI) holds significant promise for healthcare, yet its real-world adoption remains limited, partly due to uncertainty about healthcare consumer acceptance. While existing ethical frameworks provide high-level principles, there remains a need to understand healthcare consumer perspectives to ensure AI integration reflects their values and preferences. This study addresses the question: What are healthcare consumers' perspectives on AI in healthcare?

A cross-sectional qualitative research study involving online focus groups was conducted in April 2025. Participants were self-selecting adult healthcare consumers or caregivers who had accessed public healthcare in Queensland, Australia in the preceding 24 months. Analysis was guided by the World Health Organisation (WHO) ethical principles, combining deductive classifications with inductive thematic analysis. Themes were refined through consensus.

Consumers' perspectives on AI in healthcare were captured in 19 themes across all six WHO principles. The most frequently discussed principles were inclusiveness and equity (Principle 5, five themes) and transparency, explainability, and intelligibility (Principle 3, four themes). Participants emphasised the need for clear communication, equity, transparency and preservation of human interaction in clinical care.

Sustaining healthcare consumers trust and upholding traditional healthcare values by ensuring human connection in healthcare are critical for successful AI integration. Insights from this study, combined with existing evidence, can inform the future development of a values-based framework and social licence to guide safe, ethical and consumer-centred implementation of AI in healthcare.