P300: Harnessing the Power of Generative AI in Medical Writing: Insights from Alexion Medical Writing’s Strategic Thinking Workshop
Poster Presenter
Kim Wilkinson
Associate Director, Medical Writing
Alexion Astrazeneca Rare Disease United States
Objectives
The objective of the strategic thinking workshop was to explore the thoughts of the Alexion medical writing group (N=26) surrounding the use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools and the potential impact of GenAI on current medical writing (MW) practices.
Method
Task Analysis and Futures Wheels explored how GenAI may assist tasks and the ripple effects of GenAI on existing processes. Methods were applied to daily tasks; input was collected with an MS Teams word cloud poll. The output was analyzed by a human medical writer and Gemini LLM to identify themes.
Results
The Task Analysis revealed the following ways GenAI could enhance MW:
Content Generation: draft documents, create templates and generate summary text for use in regulatory submissions
Conversational Assistance: aid in brainstorming, refining language in emails, and answering technical queries
Advanced Translation: improved translation capabilities could streamline multilingual document production
Data Retrieval and Summarization: efficiently extract and summarize relevant information, allowing writers to focus on interpretation and analysis, and creation of visual aids and graphs
Content Analytics: provide insights into document structure, readability, and consistency
The Futures Wheels activity explored broader implications of integrating GenAI into MW practices:
Opportunities:
Increased Productivity: Automation of routine tasks could free up time for strategic thinking and complex writing.
Improved Output Quality: reduce errors, enhance consistency and provide real-time feedback.
Enhanced Collaboration: facilitate better communication and idea-sharing among team members.
Concerns:
Over-reliance on AI: Potential diminishment of critical thinking skills and writing expertise.
Tighter Timelines: Efficiency gains might lead to increased pressure and shorter deadlines.
Learning Curve: Need for training and upskilling to effectively use GenAI tools.
Ethical Considerations: Ensuring responsible use through human oversight and adherence to ethical guidelines.
The results demonstrated GenAI's potential to transform medical writing by enhancing efficiency and quality. However, findings underscored the importance of careful integration to address risks such as over-reliance, skill erosion, and ethical considerations. This exercise emphasized the need for a balanced approach that leverages GenAI's capabilities while maintaining human expertise and critical thinking skills.
Conclusion
The strategic thinking workshop highlighted the opportunities and challenges of integrating GenAI into MW. It emphasized the potential of GenAI tools to enhance workflows by automating repetitive tasks, improving efficiency, and enabling writers to focus on strategic, high-value activities. GenAI was identified as a key enabler for content generation, data summarization, advanced translation, and error reduction, ultimately improving the quality and consistency of deliverables when used in conjunction with non-GenAI approaches such process mapping and structured content authoring. By leveraging these tools, MWs can elevate their role as strategic contributors within cross-functional teams.
Participants also recognized challenges associated with GenAI adoption. The need for training and new skillsets to navigate the learning curve was a major consideration, alongside concerns about over-reliance on GenAI, which could erode critical thinking and writing expertise. Additionally, the pressure to meet tighter timelines due to GenAI-driven efficiency gains may impact review processes and overall output quality. Ethical considerations, such as maintaining transparency, ensuring human oversight, and addressing potential biases in GenAI-generated content, were also noted as critical for successful integration.
The workshop underscored the importance of a balanced approach to adopting GenAI. While its transformative potential is clear, careful management of risks and challenges is essential. By fostering training, ethical practices, and human oversight, the MW community can harness GenAI to boost productivity and innovation while maintaining quality and integrity. These insights can inform broader discussions across the pharmaceutical and life sciences sectors, ensuring the responsible and effective use of emerging GenAI technologies.
