Evidence map›Paper›PMID 42073489›Full record

ArticleLife (Basel, Switzerland)2026

Artificial Intelligence for Biomedical Diagnostics: Diagnostic Accuracy and Reliability of Multimodal Large Language Models in Electrocardiogram Interpretation.

Henrik Stelling, Armin Kraus, Gerrit Grieb, David Breidung, Ibrahim Güler

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Life (Basel, Switzerland), 2026. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Not yet cited in PubMed.

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0cells of the map it votes in
0citing papers in PubMed
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1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

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Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

0 citing papers in PubMed.

No citing paper in PubMed yet.

4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

5 authors.

Henrik StellingPractices for Nuclear Medicine, Rubensstraße 125, 12157 Berlin, Germany.ORCID 0009-0006-9391-3918
Armin KrausDepartment of Plastic, Aesthetic and Hand Surgery, Otto-von-Guericke University, 39120 Magdeburg, Germany.ORCID 0000-0001-6557-2163
Gerrit GriebDepartment of Plastic Surgery and Hand Surgery, Gemeinschaftskrankenhaus Havelhöhe, Kladower Damm 221, 14089 Berlin, Germany.ORCID 0000-0002-7302-210X
David BreidungDepartment of Health, University of Witten/Herdecke, 58455 Witten, Germany.
Ibrahim GülerDepartment of Health Management, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), Lange Gasse 20, 90403 Nuremberg, Germany.ORCID 0000-0002-6395-6670

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The electrocardiogram (ECG) is a central tool in cardiovascular diagnostics, yet interpretation requires expertise and remains subject to variability. Multimodal large language models (MLLMs) have shown emerging capabilities in medical image analysis, but their performance in ECG interpretation remains insufficiently characterized. This study evaluated the diagnostic accuracy and inter-run reliability of five MLLMs across ECG interpretation tasks. Thirteen standard 12-lead ECGs were presented to five models (ChatGPT-5.3, Gemini 3.1 Pro, Claude Opus 4.6, Grok 4.1, and ERNIE 5.0) across five independent runs per case, yielding 2275 task-level assessments. Six categorical interpretation tasks (rhythm, electrical axis, PR/P-wave morphology, QRS duration, ST/T-wave morphology, and QTc interval) were compared with expert-consensus ground truth, while heart rate estimation was evaluated using mean absolute error (MAE). Overall categorical accuracy ranged from 52.3% to 64.9%. QRS duration classification achieved the highest accuracy (66.2-90.8%), whereas ST/T-wave assessment showed the lowest performance (20.0-41.5%). Heart rate MAE ranged from 14.8 to 46.7 bpm. A dissociation between diagnostic accuracy and inter-run reliability was observed across models. These findings indicate that current MLLMs do not achieve clinically reliable ECG interpretation performance and highlight the importance of assessing diagnostic accuracy and inter-run reliability when evaluating artificial intelligence systems in biomedical diagnostics.

Indexed as

artificial intelligencebiomedical signal analysiscardiac rhythm analysiscardiovascular diagnosticscardiovascular physiologyclinical electrocardiographydiagnostic accuracyelectrocardiogram interpretationelectrocardiographymultimodal large language models

Identifiers

PMID42073489
PMCPMC13117897

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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.