The use of artificial intelligence in healthcare represents a breakthrough with the latest announcement from Google. At an event last week, Google CEO Sundar Pichai announced a new algorithm that could predict and help prevent cardiovascular events with a single retinal scan. The technology could reveal heart health just by looking into the eyes after comparing scans to a cardiovascular risk matrix.
The algorithm has proven to be correct 70 percent of the time it has been tested so far. A new artificial intelligence technique from Google could eliminate the need for the long series of tests and scans that are currently usually required to detect cardiovascular risk.
How does it work?
Dr. Explaining the concepts behind Google’s algorithm, Mahipal S Sachdev, chairman of the Center of Sight, said it is a two-fold process that first involves an imaging technique where an image of the retina is taken. The image reveals blood vessels, which the AI ​​then analyzes to make a diagnosis. “So if you have a vessel that is narrowing, or even in cases of cancer, leukemia or diabetic retinopathy, it can be thrown out,” the doctor said.
Tushar Vashisht, CEO of HealthifyMe, said that Google’s new AI technique is a new paradigm shift. “Until now, we’ve played with basic AI, expert systems, where you had to manually train an AI model with a specific set of data… But now with Transformers, this open vocabulary system has been trained on billions of data points, and it can be much better than the previous system for classifying results. Think of it as if an artificially intelligent brain that has a billion neurons has been trained with almost all human intelligence so far, so its ability to fine-grained, detect, diagnose, and understand information is much better and error-free than ever before.”
He added that generative AI will help gain human-like competencies, but for medical diagnosis, it’s always better to have a doctor in the loop. The use of artificial intelligence would help doctors to be able to handle more patients and lower the price and allow much deeper access for consumers.
Will it completely take over diagnostics?
Zianul Carbiwala, CTO of Tricog Health, called the Google model a partnership of artificial intelligence and medicine. “What we’re seeing is that we’re getting better diagnostic information, we’re getting cheaper tests, [we can] detect diseases that otherwise could only be detected by more expensive tests.” However, he believed that the algorithm was unlikely to completely disrupt diagnostics and remove the need for human intelligence. Dr Sandeep Mishra, Director, Institute of Cardiology, NIMS, said all these advances are adding up and helping to improve diagnostics.
“But at the end of the day, these tests are tests, so they have to be introduced by human intelligence, integrated into a management algorithm that includes diagnostics. They can be used to improve therapy, but on their own they cannot replace doctors or human intelligence.”
He emphasized the need to validate the tool and set the context for its usability.
Read Now:Third active nursery of Muusoctopus Octopus found beneath the waves of Costa Rica
