AI Ambient Scribe in Psychiatry

Evaluating the Use of an Artificial Intelligence Ambient Scribe in a Swiss Psychiatric Clinic: Efficiency, Documentation Quality, and Therapeutic Alliance

The goal of this clinical trial is to learn if an artificial intelligence (AI) tool that listens to appointments and drafts clinical notes can help clinicians in psychiatric care. Researchers also want to know if the tool changes how patients experience their care. The study includes mental health care providers (physicians, psychologists/psychotherapists, nurses, and social workers) at Psychiatrie St. Gallen and the adult patients they see in their appointments.

The main questions it aims to answer are:

• Does the AI tool lower the time clinicians spend writing notes?
• Are notes written with the AI tool as good as or better than notes written without it?
• Do patients notice a difference in their relationship with their clinician when the tool is used?

Researchers will compare clinicians who use the AI tool to clinicians who keep writing notes their usual way, before and during the intervention period, to see if writing time, note quality, and the patient-rated therapeutic relationship differ between the two groups.

Clinicians will:

Join one of two groups. One group starts using the AI tool on August 14, 2026. The other group keeps writing notes the usual way. Both groups will be observed until the end of November 2026, with note quality evaluation completed in December 2026. Clinicians who cannot contribute to all measurements may, with their consent, remain in the study for automated measurement of documentation time only.

Patients will:

• Be invited to fill out a short, anonymous survey about their experience with their clinician.
• Be asked to agree, in writing, that researchers may review the report from their initial assessment appointment.

The observed study population comprises mental health care providers (physicians, psychologists/psychotherapists, nurses, and social workers) employed at Psychiatrie St. Gallen.

Provider Inclusion Criteria:

• Readiness to use an artificial intelligence ambient scribe during patient consultations (intervention group)
• Regular clinical consultations with adult psychiatric patients

Two outcome-specific criteria apply: contribution to the report quality outcomes requires that the provider regularly conducts new-patient intakes and writes initial psychiatric assessment reports; contribution to the patient-reported outcomes requires working in the outpatient setting. Providers who cannot or no longer wish to contribute to any actively collected outcome may, with their consent, remain enrolled for passive documentation-time measurement only; for analysis, such providers stay in the group which was fixed at enrollment..

Provider Exclusion Criteria:

• notice of termination of the employment contract given during the data collection period
• Working in the dementia inpatient clinic

Patients are not the observed population, but anonymous ratings of their subjective consultation experience are collected from them, and written consent for the review of initial assessment reports is obtained.

Patient Inclusion Criteria:

- All adult patients visiting the outpatient clinic during the data collection periods for a consultation with a participating provider

Patient Exclusion Criteria:

• Insufficient German proficiency (below level B2)
• Cognitive impairment precluding informed participation
• Acute psychosis, acute suicidality, mania, or intoxication
• Severe emotional distress