The market is healthy for healthcare AI research, but what’s in it for patients?

As speculation continues to swirl around AI’s forthcoming transformation of healthcare, fueling boom times in AI research, a review of the literature has turned up scant evidence the technology is benefiting patients at the consumer level. “Without a clear understanding on why patients and consumers need AI in the first place, or how AI could support individuals with their healthcare needs, it is difficult to imagine the kinds of AI applications that would have meaningful and sustainable impact on individual daily lives,” write the authors, who were led in the project by Annie Lau, PhD, of Macquarie University in Australia. Lau and team arrived at their conclusions after systematically searching PubMed for studies published in calendar year 2018. The full study is running online in Yearbook of Medical Informatics. From an initial crop of 99 papers meeting their inclusion criteria, the researchers culled 14 as “best paper” candidates and presented them to a panel of international experts for full review and scoring.