WASHINGTON, D.C.—At the annual Health Datapalooza conference hosted by Academy Health, health IT leaders came together to discuss some of the most pressing issues in the adoption of AI by the healthcare industry.
Among those issues were the extent to which patients are able to participate in conversations with their providers about their use of AI, the widening digital divide between rural healthcare and academic medical centers and the proliferation of AI legislation at the state level.
Here are some of the perspectives shared during the conference on the state of AI in healthcare.
Lynne Chou O’Keefe, Partner at Define Ventures:
“From a very venture capital perspective, [this is] a once-in-a-lifetime [opportunity]. Having lived through SaaS, to mobile, to big data, other areas like blockchain, I really don't think we've seen anything like AI going forward. It's not just an opportunity. I think it's an imperative for our space.”
Jen Horonjeff, Founder and CEO of Savvy Cooperative:
“It's just very common still for patients to get shut down if they bring forward data themselves, be it from ChatGPT, you know it's Dr. Google, you know it's Dr. AI now, and you know, even if I'm trying to share my Oura ring data or Apple Watch data, I know that with this provider I can talk about that, and this provider [will] roll their eyes. I literally had somebody tell me that you'd be better off spending that money on a pair of shoes than trusting any of that kind of stuff.”
Grace Cordovano, Founder of Enlightening Results:
“There's no reimbursement pathway, so my doctor and my care team [are] not incentivized to talk about AI. So how are we building trust? So patients are using it on their own. We get mocked and scoffed at and turned down for using it, but we want to be partners.”
Lisa Bari, Head of Policy and External Affairs at Innovaccer:
“This is the piece that's missing here, is that you have things that patients have access to and want to do, and you have enterprise concerns and considerations around the use of health IT and AI-driven tools, digital health tools. You have asymmetric data, you have asymmetric information as well. We have a bunch of policy efforts right now to try to change that, but perhaps one of the other ways to bridge the trust gap is to, again, make that full set of data available to all parties, to the provider, to the patient, to the people caring for them.”
Siliva Trujillo, Vice President of Public Policy and Regulatory Affairs at OCHIN:
“My concern is that, in order to use AI tools, which are essential in the safety net in light of the existential crisis faced, not only with the forthcoming Medicaid cuts, numerous policy changes, but changes also to the 340B program … I'm concerned about all of the safety net providers that have antiquated systems that haven't been updated, and they are in no position whatsoever to adopt AI tools that we will be talking about. I mean, it's just a full stop non-starter, and that will be the most significant digital divide we've ever had in the history of health information technology, that we've ever seen. It will drive disparities for rural communities and other underserved communities at a level and to a degree that will be very difficult to overcome, if not addressed in the next couple of years, and certainly outside of five years, their inability to catch up will be fully foreclosed.”
Daniel Yang, M.D., Vice President of AI and Emerging Technologies at Kaiser Permanente:
“I know at the federal government they're taking a more hands-off approach, but that has certainly not slowed the states in proposing AI legislation and regulations. So just to give you some context, we're tracking 500 proposed state legislation related to AI. They use different definitions. California approaches this way. Maryland a slightly different way. Some are comprehensive bills. Others are very niche bills. And so the compliance requirements, managing all of this is becoming very difficult, and so these are all compounding challenges.”