Medi-Scribe: Symptom Timeline Builder
Inspiration The average GP consultation in England lasts under twelve minutes. Yet research from the University of Manchester found that diagnostic errors occur in 4.3% of GP consultations, and in 40% of those cases, the harm to the patient is moderate or severe. A separate BMJ study found that 23% of symptoms go undisclosed in consultations, not because patients are hiding things, but because they forget, self-censor, or simply don't realise something is relevant.
We built this tool because the problem isn't the doctor and it isn't the patient, it's the structure of the interaction. A ten-minute appointment is not enough time to simultaneously take a history, examine, diagnose, and explain. Something has to move outside the room. We chose history-taking.
What it does Symptom Timeline Builder is an AI tool that helps patients construct a structured, clinical-quality symptom history before their GP appointment, so the consultation can start at diagnosis rather than at "so, what brings you in today?"
A patient describes their complaint in plain language, or speaks it aloud using the Web Speech API. Claude generates 8-12 personalised follow-up questions using the standard HPC (History of Presenting Complaint) framework: onset, character, location, severity, timing, modifying factors, associated symptoms, and context.
After answering those questions, the patient is shown 3–5 additional questions drawn from a 20-question bias-reduction library, designed specifically to surface what patients typically self-censor: family history, recent rashes, travel, night sweats, hormonal changes. Claude selects whichever questions are most diagnostically relevant to this complaint.
The output is a structured, printable clinical timeline, sorted chronologically, colour-coded by event type, with a severity scale, that the patient hands to their doctor. The export is formatted for A4 printing with a clear disclaimer that this is patient-prepared information, not a clinical assessment.
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