GE and Partners, which owns Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, will spend the next 10 years creating artificial intelligence software that can detect how severe a stroke is and identify tumors in medical images.
We have more and more information, and the information comes at our clinicians in a way that can be unmanageable,” said David Torchiana, CEO of Partners HealthCare. GE and Partners, which owns Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, will spend the next 10 years creating artificial intelligence software that can detect how severe a stroke is and identify tumors in medical images.
Partners HealthCare and GE Healthcare announced a 10-year collaboration to rapidly develop, validate and strategically integrate deep learning technology across the entire continuum of care. The collaboration will be executed through the newly formed Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women’s Hospital Center for Clinical Data Science and will feature co-located, multidisciplinary teams with broad access to data, computational infrastructure and clinical expertise. The initial focus of the relationship will be on the development of applications aimed to improve clinician productivity and patient outcomes in diagnostic imaging. Over time, the groups will create new business models for applying AI to healthcare and develop products for additional medical specialties like molecular pathology, genomics and population health.
“This is an important moment for medicine,” said David Torchiana, MD, CEO of Partners HealthCare. “Clinicians are inundated with data, and the patient experience suffers from inefficiencies in the healthcare industry. By combining the expertise at Mass General and Brigham and Women’s with the spirit of innovation at GE, this partnership has the resources and vision to accelerate the development and adoption of deep learning technology. Together, we can empower clinicians with the tools needed to store, analyze and leverage the flood of information to more effectively deliver care to patients.”
A hospital using AI will improve patient care and allow doctors to spend more time with patients instead of toiling over mindless data entry tasks, GE Healthcare and Partners said, noting an AI infusion in health care worldwide could reduce costs and improve access. “Doctors are spending time on things that really are incredibly redundant, and if a machine can do it, let them do it,” said Zen Chu, faculty director of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s health care ventures course and the Hacking Medicine initiative.
A hospital using AI will improve patient care and allow doctors to spend more time with patients instead of toiling over mindless data entry tasks, GE Healthcare and Partners said, noting an AI infusion in health care worldwide could reduce costs and improve access.
The first use of the technology will focus on medical images such as X-rays, MRIs and other scans and could help determine the impact of a stroke, quickly identify emergency room patients with fractures, and help track how tumors respond to new cancer treatments. A computer would analyze the images and pick out abnormal results rather than requiring a doctor or technician to spend time staring at scans.
The collaboration will be a featured project of the MGH & BWH Center for Clinical Data Science. GE Healthcare was chosen as the primary co-developer because of its shared commitment to digital health, its software and analytics capabilities, and its reputation for driving productivity gains.
“We’re evolving the healthcare system to be able to take advantage of the benefits of deep learning, bringing together hospitals, data sets and clinical and technical minds unlike ever before,” said Keith Dreyer, DO, PhD, Chief Data Science Officer, Departments of Radiology at MGH and BWH. “The scope reflects the reality that advancements in clinical data science require substantial commitments of capital, expertise, personnel and cooperation between the system and industry.”
The collaboration aligns with GE’s ambition to become a top 10 software business by 2020. The company’s recent headquarters move to Boston – a global medical and technology hub – has helped foster new levels of collaboration with top hospitals and health systems like Partners HealthCare.
“By partnering to bring clinicians smart technology that can be seamlessly integrated into clinical workflows, we’re building a better, digital future for healthcare together,” said Charles Koontz, Chief Digital Officer of GE Healthcare.
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