NMC tells doctors to mark AI promotions and drop patient testimonials

The National Medical Commission has brought Instagram posts, influencer campaigns, sponsored placements and AI-generated videos under the same advertising rules that already bind a doctor's nameplate. The Guidelines on Ethical Advertising and Public Communication by Hospitals, Medical Institutions and Registered Medical Practitioners were issued on 6 October under file R-13014/01/2024-Ethics, and they took effect at once.

The notice ties the guidelines to Writ Petition (Civil) No. 1160 of 2023 in the Supreme Court, and to the Indian Medical Council (Professional Conduct, Etiquette and Ethics) Regulations, 2002. The practical change is in the definition. Advertising now includes websites, social media, messaging platforms, podcasts, influencer marketing, digital campaigns, sponsored posts, public interviews, news articles intended for promotion, online healthcare platforms, and artificial-intelligence-generated promotion.

What a doctor may no longer post

The rules bar patient testimonials, paid or fake reviews, misleading claims, guaranteed treatment outcomes and promotional patient stories. A registered medical practitioner cannot claim that a treatment, a facility or a personal expertise is superior to others unless the claim can be substantiated. That sentence is aimed at the comparison posts that hospitals have used for a decade: success rates without a denominator, before-and-after photographs, and a celebrity patient.

Clause 7.2 is the line hospitals will have to rewrite this week. An AI-generated promotional campaign for the furtherance of commercial interest is prohibited. Where AI-generated promotional content is still used and conforms to the guidelines, the regulations, and the relevant clinical establishments law, it must carry a source mark stating that the origin of the content is AI. AI-generated or AI-assisted content must not be used to create misleading or unverifiable representations of diagnosis, treatment, clinical outcomes, qualifications, patient experiences or services.

Why the Supreme Court petition is in the header

The commission did not invent the problem in October. The 2002 ethics regulations already restricted solicitation. What changed is the medium. A testimonial that would have been a newspaper advertisement is now a reel, and an avatar can deliver a script no patient spoke. By writing AI-generated promotion into the definition of a medium of advertisement, the NMC has made the old ban portable. A hospital cannot argue that a generated video is content rather than an ad.

The source-mark rule is narrower than a ban, and it is the part with a compliance test. If a clip is allowed at all, the viewer must be told it was made by a model. Unlabelled AI is a breach even when the underlying claim is true. That is a different obligation from the ban on guaranteed outcomes, which turns on whether the words overclaim.

Who has to change a feed this week

The guidelines bind both registered medical practitioners and hospitals. A doctor's personal account and a chain's branded account sit in the same net if the post has a promotional character. Messaging platforms are named, including WhatsApp and Telegram, so a forwarded patient story can qualify. Influencer marketing is named, so a paid creator is not a way around the testimonial ban.

The commission has not, in the public notice, set a fine schedule. Enforcement still runs through the ethics machinery and, where a clinical establishments act applies, through state rules. The date that matters for a hospital social team is 6 October. Material posted after that without a source mark, or built as an AI campaign to sell a procedure, is already outside the text the NMC has issued.