Gemini 1.5 Flash provides the most reliable content while ChatGPT-4o offers the highest readability for patient education on meniscal tears.

Journal: Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA
Published Date:

Abstract

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to comparatively evaluate the responses generated by three advanced artificial intelligence (AI) models, ChatGPT-4o (OpenAI), Gemini 1.5 Flash (Google) and DeepSeek-V3, to frequently asked patient questions about meniscal tears in terms of reliability, usefulness, quality, and readability. METHODS: Responses from three AI chatbots, ChatGPT-4o (OpenAI), Gemini 1.5 Flash (Google) and DeepSeek-V3 (DeepSeek AI), were evaluated for 20 common patient questions regarding meniscal tears. Three orthopaedic specialists independently scored reliability and usefulness on 7-point Likert scales and overall response quality using the 5-point Global Quality Scale. Readability was analysed with six established indices. Inter-rater agreement was examined with intraclass correlation coefficients (ICCs) and Fleiss' Kappa, while between-model differences were tested using Kruskal-Wallis and ANOVA with Bonferroni adjustment. RESULTS: Gemini 1.5 Flash achieved the highest reliability, significantly outperforming both GPT-4o and DeepSeek-V3 (p = 0.001). While usefulness scores were broadly similar, Gemini was superior to DeepSeek-V3 (p = 0.045). Global Quality Scale scores did not differ significantly among models. In contrast, GPT-4o consistently provided the most readable content (p < 0.001). Inter-rater reliability was excellent across all evaluation domains (ICC > 0.9). CONCLUSION: All three AI models generated high-quality educational content regarding meniscal tears. Gemini 1.5 Flash demonstrated the highest reliability and usefulness, while GPT-4o provided significantly more readable responses. These findings highlight the trade-off between reliability and readability in AI-generated patient education materials and emphasise the importance of physician oversight to ensure safe, evidence-based integration of these tools into clinical practice. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level V, observation-based, expert opinion-based, or in vitro/artificial intelligence model evaluation.

Authors

  • Başar Burak Çakmur
    Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology, Beylikduzu State Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey.
  • Ali Can Koluman
    Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology, Bakirkoy Dr. Sadi Konuk Training and Research, Istanbul, Turkey.
  • Mehmet Utku Çiftçi
    Department of Orthopedics and Traumatology, Sultan Abdulhamid Han Training and Research Hospital, Istanbul, Turkey.
  • Ebru Aloğlu Çiftçi
    Faculty of Health Sciences, Department of Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation, Istanbul Okan University, Istanbul, Turkey.
  • Nezih Ziroğlu
    Vocational School of Health Services, Department of Orthopedic Prosthetics and Orthotics, Acıbadem Mehmet Ali Aydınlar University, Istanbul, Turkey.

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