Mental health therapists who use AI to take notes face questions about trust : NPR
Mental health therapists who use AI to take notes face questions about trust : NPR
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/nx-s1-5826943
Publish Date: 2026-05-26 05:00:00
Source Domain: www.npr.org
A MARTÍNEZ, HOST:
More therapists are seeing how they can use artificial intelligence tools in their work. Supporters say recording sessions and using AI to create notes saves time. Critics worry it could alter the trust between patients and their clinicians at the heart of therapy. Here’s NPR’s Windsor Johnston.
WINDSOR JOHNSTON, BYLINE: Molly Quinn is a 31-year-old librarian in Fayetteville, Arkansas. For two years, she trusted her therapist with things she hadn’t told anyone else. But during a session last November, something felt different.
MOLLY QUINN: It wasn’t until halfway through the session that I realized that she wasn’t taking notes herself, like she typically did. She was just, like, letting the iPad stand up.
JOHNSTON: Quinn kept talking. But later she realized the conversation had been recorded using an artificial intelligence note-taking tool without her consent.
QUINN: It felt like a violation. And the more that I thought about it, like, I don’t know, I just started getting, like, more and more sick to my stomach.
JOHNSTON: Quinn left the session that day not knowing what to do. Across the country, a growing number of therapists are experimenting with AI tools that record sessions, transcribe conversations and automatically generate clinical notes. When activated, the software captures the discussion in real time and produces a structured draft note for the clinician to review, and in many cases, submit to insurance companies for reimbursement.
Companies behind the technology include Berries, Blueprint and SimplePractice, among others. They all say the systems are HIPAA-compliant and designed to help therapists spend less time on paperwork and more time focusing on patients. But some experts say the technology raises new ethical questions. Kellie Owens is a bioethics researcher at New York University.
KELLIE OWENS: We have a wide body of research showing us that a consent form on its own does not mean that a person is making…
