Using secure, open-weight AI to protect compassionate care in family medicine

Family doctors and their teams spend hours on paperwork (writing referral letters, sorting incoming requests, and documenting visits) time that could otherwise go to connecting with patients. Zachary’s project asks whether secure open-weight artificial intelligence (AI) tools can safely reduce that administrative burden. Just as importantly, it asks whether the time saved is actually reinvested in compassionate, relational care rather than absorbed by other demands. Working with clinical partners, Zack will co-design AI tools alongside patients, caregivers, clinicians, and trainees, then measure their effect on workload, privacy, and patients’ experience of compassionate care. The goal is a practical, privacy-protecting model that other Canadian healthcare organizations can adopt to ensure AI strengthens, rather than erodes, the human heart of care.