There are also ethical implications in using AI and ML technologies on decision support systems. Several leading radiology, medical physics and imaging informatics groups released a statement earlier this year on the ethical use of AI in radiology, saying that while AI has the potential to improve patient care and physician workflows, an ethical framework will “help steer technological development, influence how different stakeholders respond to and use AI, and implement these tools to make best decisions and actions for patients.”

The future of CDS
CDS systems are an integral part of modern EHR systems. But major EHR vendors are not known for being great innovators and have been slow to incorporate AI/ML. These innovations generally come from new, dynamic technology companies or even from other industries.
Some EHR vendors, however,have begun to recognize the opportunities that AI brings to the table and are starting to collaborate with leading AI players to bring these opportunities to clinicians and organizations. While the practical adoption of AI in CDS (as in medicine in general) is not free of barriers, and the immediate benefits are often exaggerated, there continues to be rapid advances in its capabilities and ease of use. New open source tools are available and even some cloud platforms provide AI/ML modules for use. Innovative providers and health systems are starting to play with these tools. The development of custom solutions, unique to given situations, may be the fastest and most efficient way to move forward while waiting for these tools to be embedded into an EHR solution.

About the author: Anatoly Postilnik is the head of healthcare IT practice at First Line Software which provides software engineering, software enablement, and digital transformation advisory services for healthcare IT, machine learning and enterprise data management, as well as retail digitalization, and web content management and eCommerce.

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