Utah pilot lets artificial intelligence prescribe acne treatments

SALT LAKE CITY — A digital health startup has launched a pilot program in Utah that uses artificial intelligence to evaluate patients and recommend prescription acne treatments without an in-person visit with a doctor.

Nolla Health began a one-year pilot program in Utah Monday focused on treating mild to moderate acne.

“We thought that was a good place to start because you can deal with it quite well with topical prescriptions,” said Nolla chief medical advisor Dr. Zaid Fadul.

Patients who pay the $4.99 subscription and enroll provide basic health information, including family history, and upload photos of their face taken in different lighting. The AI system analyzes the images, maps the patient’s skin and generates a treatment recommendation.

Prescriptions can then be sent directly to patients or to a local pharmacy. Patients participate in weekly follow-up check-ins to monitor their progress.

“Either patients are started and doing well and they keep moving along, or they’re started and not getting the results they want, and they get bumped up to one of our clinicians,” Fadul said.

Fadul said licensed medical providers are available through telehealth around the clock. He said medications that aren’t topical are escalated to his team, not AI.

Currently, Nolla is not prescribing birth control, but according to its website and Fadul, it’s something they’re exploring.

During the first stage of the pilot, the first 100 patients, physicians will review the AI’s prescription recommendation before it is sent to a pharmacy. Fadul said in the next stage, for the next approximately 500 patients, doctors will review recommendations after prescriptions have already been issued by the AI system. After that, oversight will become less rigorous, he said.

“That first hundred patients is really critically important, in addition to the 10,000 plus cases that we tested ahead of time,” Fadul said. “This has already been tested out. This has already been thoroughly mapped out and rigorously processed, and this is just a chance to do it live.”

Utah officials say they are closely monitoring the program.

Ordinarily, a license is required from the state to practice medicine. According to Utah’s Office of AI Policy, Nolla applied under a special program to test its medical treatment plan.

“We can let them run a business model that is kind of different from the normal regulations for a little while and try to assess as a state whether we think it could be beneficial,” said office director Zach Boyd.

He said the office has an oversight and deployment plan that includes monthly reports.

“They just submit to us things like the number of patients that they’ve served, any outcomes they’ve observed,” Boyd said.

He said members of Utah’s medical licensing board were included in the process to develop the pilot program.

Boyd said state leaders are interested in exploring whether artificial intelligence can help address healthcare challenges.

“People are dissatisfied with the healthcare system, and we have a shortage of workers,” Boyd said. “We have long wait times, expensive prices.”

Fadul said Utah was selected for the pilot because the company sees demand for new healthcare options and hopes AI tools can help physicians focus on more serious medical conditions.

“If you’ve got a melanoma problem, do you want your dermatologists who are busy seeing a lot of basic acne cases, or focusing more on potentially lifesaving intervention for melanoma?” he said.

He said he would like to see the AI program expand.

“I think one day we may, if the data proves out like I think it will, it’s hopefully something that’ll be from 13 [years old] and up,” Dr. Fadul said.

He also thinks it shows promise in the areas of radiology and testing-based platforms, like treating urinary tract infections and influenza.