Hitesh Kumar, Ritvik Prakash, Saurav Prakash, Amiya Mrinal

ABSTRACT

Background: Generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot are rapidly entering clinical workflows worldwide. Their real-world reception among Indian physicians — who work under distinctive resource, cost, and volume pressures — remains under-explored. Objective: To assess Indian physicians' perceptions of GenAI in terms of clinical productivity, documentation burden, administrative workload, information access, cost efficiency, and readiness for routine integration. Methods: A cross-sectional online survey was conducted among 53 practising physicians across government, private, corporate, and academic settings in India. The instrument comprised five demographic items, one usage-frequency item, nine five-point Likert statements, and one open-ended question. Descriptive statistics, Cronbach's alpha, Spearman correlation, Kruskal–Wallis, Mann–Whitney U, and chi-square tests were applied at ? = 0.05. Results: Daily GenAI users accounted for 45.3% of respondents; only 3.8% were non-users. Physicians reported strongest agreement that GenAI reduces documentation time (mean 4.19 ± 0.71) and improves medical writing quality (4.19 ± 0.79), followed by administrative workload reduction (4.09 ± 0.63) and clinical information access (4.04 ± 0.65). Perceived impact on patient-facing time (3.38 ± 0.93) and operational cost reduction (3.59 ± 0.80) was more modest. Internal consistency was good (Cronbach's ? = 0.80). Frequency of GenAI use correlated positively with future-use intention (? = 0.415, p = 0.002), integration readiness (? = 0.328, p = 0.016), medical writing benefit (? = 0.359, p = 0.008), productivity (? = 0.302, p = 0.028), and documentation efficiency (? = 0.282, p = 0.041). Attitudes did not differ significantly by qualification, practice setting, age, or experience (all p > 0.05). Conclusion: Indian physicians hold predominantly favourable views of GenAI, particularly for documentation and knowledge-work efficiency, with more cautious appraisals of its economic and patient-time dividends. Higher exposure is linked to greater acceptance, supporting structured training, ethical governance, and pilot integration into routine clinical practice.