Assessing ChatGPT 4.0’s test performance and clinical diagnostic accuracy on USMLE STEP 2 CK and clinical case reports

• Published in: Scientific reports 2024-04, Vol.14 (1), p.9330-9330, Article 9330
• Main Authors: Shieh, Allen, Tran, Brandon, He, Gene, Kumar, Mudit, Freed, Jason A., Majety, Priyanka
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: 692/1537; 692/308; 692/700/139; Accuracy; Artificial Intelligence; Case reports; Chatbots; ChatGPT 4; Clinical Competence; Diagnosis, Differential; Diagnostic accuracy; Differential diagnosis; Educational Measurement - methods; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Licensing examinations; Licensure, Medical; multidisciplinary; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); United States; USMLE
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-024-58760-x

While there is data assessing the test performance of artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots, including the Generative Pre-trained Transformer 4.0 (GPT 4) chatbot (ChatGPT 4.0), there is scarce data on its diagnostic accuracy of clinical cases. We assessed the large language model (LLM), ChatGPT 4.0, on its ability to answer questions from the United States Medical Licensing Exam (USMLE) Step 2, as well as its ability to generate a differential diagnosis based on corresponding clinical vignettes from published case reports. A total of 109 Step 2 Clinical Knowledge (CK) practice questions were inputted into both ChatGPT 3.5 and ChatGPT 4.0, asking ChatGPT to pick the correct answer. Compared to its previous version, ChatGPT 3.5, we found improved accuracy of ChatGPT 4.0 when answering these questions, from 47.7 to 87.2% ( p  = 0.035) respectively. Utilizing the topics tested on Step 2 CK questions, we additionally found 63 corresponding published case report vignettes and asked ChatGPT 4.0 to come up with its top three differential diagnosis. ChatGPT 4.0 accurately created a shortlist of differential diagnoses in 74.6% of the 63 case reports (74.6%). We analyzed ChatGPT 4.0’s confidence in its diagnosis by asking it to rank its top three differentials from most to least likely. Out of the 47 correct diagnoses, 33 were the first (70.2%) on the differential diagnosis list, 11 were second (23.4%), and three were third (6.4%). Our study shows the continued iterative improvement in ChatGPT’s ability to answer standardized USMLE questions accurately and provides insights into ChatGPT’s clinical diagnostic accuracy.