Few industries are more ripe for creative disruption than healthcare, which consumes huge sums of public and private funding while still battling to meet demand from growing and ageing populations around the world. As a result, artificial intelligence is increasingly becoming a force to be reckoned with in the medical field. But, as in many industries, its full potential is only now starting to emerge, and uncertainty remains about exactly how AI can best be harnessed to deliver better, more efficient care — and improve the experiences of patients and healthcare staff.  Perhaps the area where AI has provoked the greatest excitement is in its potential to improve the speed and accuracy with which diagnostic scans are interpreted. For example, Imperial College Health Partners in the UK — which brings together NHS providers, universities and industry across north-west London — sees a big role for the technology in delivering health innovations using real-world evidence. Its chief executive, Axel Heitmueller, says AI systems already allow MRI and CAT body scans, and X-rays, to be read “perhaps more consistently than humans can”. However, he cautions that clinical professionals should not be taken out of the equation: “The evidence emerging, despite all the hype, [is that it’s] when you combine human and machine that you get the best results.” One area that needs more discussion is the baseline against which AI tools should be judged in the field of diagnostics, he says. “Everyone always focuses on the machine and complains that a machine is not perfect. But we have never had [perfection] with healthcare professionals, so that raises the question: what is an acceptable failure rate for humans?”

Full report : How doctors are pioneering the use of AI to improve outcomes for patients, including faster diagnostics, more targeted treatment, and better communication.