Dec - Jan 20198In My OpinionHEALTHCARE'S BEST SHOT AT DOING AI RIGHT: MAKE IT INVISIBLEAI won't cure cancer. It won't solve healthcare's interoperability problem. And it won't replace your radiologist. That stated, I agree with Curtis Langlotz, MD, PhD of Stanford, who stated at RSNA this year that radiologists who use AI will replace radiologists who don't.So, what is the path toward making AI a key enabler for medicine? AI-powered healthcare requires three key factors: sound data science, sharp focus and strategic deployment. And, it requires the patience to balance the excitement of advanced digital technology with the practical realities of how healthcare operates. Sound data scienceAsking if healthcare is ready for AI is a two-part question. First, we must evaluate whether the technology is ready--are the volumes of data accessible, is the data of sufficient quality, and is the computing power available and affordable? Hospitals generate 50 petabytes of data per year. Most of that data is now digital and comes from a variety of sources: EMRs, intelligent devices and increasingly home health wearable technology. Further, governments wanting to improve healthcare are releasing yet more data to the market, as evidenced by the recent release of more than 100,000 X-ray images by the NIH. But volume is not enough, and errors abound not just in EMR data but in DICOM images and their labels as well.We don't just need data, we need high quality data--information that has been reviewed and well annotated to feed the algorithm. Thankfully, radiologists are really good at creating high quality data. Finally, we need cheap access to massive computing power, and in the last five years we've seen an explosion of GPU computing readily accessible from every cloud provider.The technology is ready, but we must also address the second part of the question--the readiness of the industry.Sharp focus If you believe everything you read in the headlines, you might think AI is well on its way to taking over healthcare. Alternatively, you may be of the camp that still believes AI is over-hyped and under-delivered. I argue that healthcare's "readiness reality" is somewhere in between. According to a recent HIMSS Analytics survey, only 52 percent of providers plan to leverage AI initiatives in clinical departments within the next two years.Keith Bigelow, GM of Analytics, GE HealthcareBy
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