Call for papers: "Generative AI and the Transformation of Health Communication"

2025-09-28

Call for papers: Special Issue:

Generative AI and the Transformation of Health Communication

Qualitative Health Communication (QHC) invites submissions for a special issue dedicated to exploring the emerging intersections between generative artificial intelligence (AI) and health communication. As generative AI systems increasingly enter clinical, educational, and patient-facing contexts, there is a pressing need to critically examine how these technologies are shaping communication practices, relationships, identities, and ethical boundaries in health and care. Generative AI is utilised within established clinical communication practices, for example to improve documentation, in clinician-patient email communication with specialists and general practitioners and in the face-to-face clinician-patient encounters in the form of machine translation, also in nursing or allied health contexts. Furthermore, generative AI is used by patients before or after accessing healthcare systems to aid the understanding of symptoms and diagnoses, for counselling purposes and to prepare  for or assist with information shared during clinic visits.

We welcome qualitative studies that examine the social, cultural, and communicative dimensions of generative AI in health communication-related contexts. This includes how generative AI mediates, augments, displaces, or transforms existing modes of communication for and between healthcare professionals, patients, institutions, and the public.

Possible topics Include (but are not limited to):

  • Generative AI use during clinical encounters
  • Generative AI use for documentation purposes
  • Generative AI use for asynchronous communication such as email
  • Generative AI use in mental health, therapy, or health coaching communication
  • Patient perceptions and experiences of communicating with AI for health advice or decision support
  • The narrative and discursive construction of trust, authority, or empathy in AI-generated interactions
  • Ethical tensions in AI-mediated health communication, e.g. related to transparency, responsibility and bias
  • Institutional discourses and policies shaping or regulating generative AI use in healthcare
  • Generative AI in multilingual health contexts (e.g. machine translation)
  • The use of generative AI for training healthcare professionals in communication skills

We are especially interested in empirically grounded and critically engaged work on how emerging technologies interact with health communication.

We welcome articles that deal with one or some of the above topics as well as other topics related to generative AI and health communication. Articles must have a strong qualitative focus.

Guest editors

Kristine Bundgaard, Aalborg University, Denmark
Matilde Nisbeth Brøgger, Aarhus University, Denmark
Maarit Koponen, University of Eastern Finland, Finland

Timeline

  • Call for papers published: September 2025
  • Submission of abstract: 15 December 2025
  • Notification: 1 February 2026
  • Manuscript submission: 1 June 2026
  • Peer review process: 1 June-15 August 2026
  • Revision process: 1 September-1 November 2026
  • Final decision and notification: 1 December 2026
  • Publication of the special issue: January 2027

Submission guidelines

Interested contributors are invited to send an abstract of no more than 600 words with a title by 15 December 2025 to the journal’s email address (qhc-journal@au.dk). Abstracts may include an additional page for data, examples of analyses, or other relevant information that does not lend itself well to an abstract. Please supply references (not included in the word limit). Authors will receive notification whether their abstracts have been accepted by 1 February 2026. Manuscripts are due by 1 June 2026.

Full manuscript submissions should be submitted through the journal's online submission system. Articles will go through the ordinary peer review process. Please indicate in the cover letter that your submission is intended for the special issue on "Generative AI and the Transformation of Health Communication". Authors should adhere to the journal's author guidelines (https://tidsskrift.dk/qhc/about/submissions).