Healthcare IT Today
January 15, 2024
Joseph Zabinski, Ph.D., Managing Director, AI & Personalized Medicine at OM1
The Anti-Prediction of AI in 2024: The healthcare industry likes to compare artificial intelligence (AI) to a standard of perfection – we want it to get the answer ‘right’ every time, and sometimes, we’ll even hear this claimed as a ‘goal.’ The reality is, this won’t happen next year (or the next, or the next!). In 2024, we must compare what AI can do to the world as it is – real patient journeys, real diagnostic procedures, and (lack of) uptake, and real treatment decision-making under tremendous uncertainty. AI will always disappoint if we expect it to be perfect, but it can be incredibly helpful if we use patients’ lived experiences as our baseline to create well-supported solutions that address real problems.
The key to AI adoption: acceptance among patients: As we move into 2024, a key challenge to artificial intelligence (AI) adoption will be acceptance among patients, particularly as cases of AI ‘getting it wrong’ are widely publicized in the media. In 2023, AI became a familiar concept, but next year, the industry needs to take the next step of supplying clarity, transparency, repeatability, and answers around AI’s strengths and weaknesses directly to patients. To do so successfully comes down to using AI when it makes sense – not always – and framing the added value AI can create. The gap between what AI can do in theory, and what it actually does in the real world will only be closed if we address barriers to access and acceptance among patients. In 2024, the industry needs to be specific about the value AI creates; efficient and seamless in its delivery for providers and patients; and resolute in the use of insights to help make decisions – only then will we see acceptance and the next step of adoption.