{"slug": "utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients", "title": "Utah Pilots AI-Only Examination and Prescription Process for Certain Patients", "summary": "Utah launched a one-year pilot program on Monday allowing Nolla Health's Nolla Derm app to issue initial acne prescriptions without a doctor for patients with mild-to-moderate acne, with severe or complex cases referred to a human physician. The app, which costs $4.99 per month, takes facial images and medical history to produce an \"acne severity score,\" and phases in autonomy: doctors are in the loop for the first 100 prescriptions, review the first 500 retroactively, and afterward review only a sample of cases. Nolla Health Chief Medical Advisor Dr. Zaid Fadul said the AI \"can't improvise\" and prescribes only a \"short list of physician-approved topical treatments\"; the program follows Utah's January pilot allowing AI to renew certain prescriptions after a doctor validates the initial action, which drew backlash from doctors who consider it unsafe.", "body_md": "Predictions that highly skilled jobs in medicine would simply be automated with AI, sometimes articulated by luminaries like Geoffrey Hinton, [haven’t panned out so far](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/14/technology/ai-jobs-radiologists-mayo-clinic.html). Just picturing what it would theoretically be like to be examined by an AI doctor made the AI-enabled enshittification of healthcare seem like a distant danger at the absolute worst. But a new pilot program in Utah might clear away some of the fog around this concept, and make visits to Dr. Slop feel one step closer to reality.\n\nFor now it’s just a one-year program, [according to a Monday story from Bloomberg](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-10-05/nolla-health-ai-can-now-prescribe-acne-drugs-in-utah-without-doctors?accessToken=eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJzb3VyY2UiOiJTdWJzY3JpYmVyR2lmdGVkQXJ0aWNsZSIsImlhdCI6MTc5MTIxNjEzOSwiZXhwIjoxNzkxODIwOTM5LCJhcnRpY2xlSWQiOiJUTUZMODVLSVAzS00wMCIsImJjb25uZWN0SWQiOiI4OUM4OTNDMDhGOTQ0NThDQkQwQTQyREY1RDFCOTY0QyJ9.crHEdlDbj7Dx78MJpxZ7nHnh7NmskJmIYVmdbeyomfE), and it’s only for patients with [mild-to-moderate](https://www.theverge.com/ai-artificial-intelligence/1005075/nolla-health-acne-ai-prescriptions) acne. Severe or complex cases will be referred to a human doctor.\n\nAnd this is the second big step Utah has taken toward automating some of the more transactional aspects of the American healthcare system. [In January](https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama-health-forum/fullarticle/2846947), Utah rolled out another pilot program that allows patients to opt into an AI system in which—after a doctor’s validation of the initial action—an AI can renew certain prescriptions. There’s an [ongoing backlash](https://www.wsj.com/health/healthcare/ai-doctors-utah-374653c8) to that program from doctors who believe it’s unsafe.\n\nThe new acne pilot, which started Monday, involves the use of an app called Nolla Derm from a company called Nolla Health. The app takes images of the patient’s face, and asks them to then input their personal details and medical history. Nolla Derm analyzes their acne, the presence of excess skin oil, and gives them, according to Bloomberg, an “acne severity score.”\n\n[According to a press release](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/nolla-health-announces-nations-first-ai-to-issue-initial-prescriptions-302897659.html), the program will not be fully automated for a while, requiring a slow phase in, in which doctors are in the loop for the first 100 prescriptions. That will be followed by a “phase two,” for the first 500 prescriptions, in which the AI fully prescribes the medications, but doctors review those prescriptions retroactively. After that the prescriptions are fully automated, though a doctor will review a sample of cases afterward.\n\nThe release quotes Nolla Health’s Chief Medical Advisor Dr. Zaid Fadul as saying the AI “can’t improvise,” and that prescriptions include only a “short list of physician-approved topical treatments.” The app costs $4.99 per month.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients", "canonical_source": "https://gizmodo.com/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients-2000821993", "published_at": "2026-10-06 03:16:03+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-10-06 03:17:16.018888+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-policy", "artificial-intelligence", "ai-products"], "entities": ["Utah", "Nolla Health", "Nolla Derm", "Zaid Fadul", "Bloomberg", "Geoffrey Hinton"], "also_reported_by": [], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/utah-pilots-ai-only-examination-and-prescription-process-for-certain-patients.jsonld"}}