Keynote Presentation:
“Artificial Intelligence Meets the Healing Arts: Reimagining 21st Century Healthcare“
Artificial intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing healthcare for both health care providers and patients. For healthcare providers, AI is enhancing diagnostics, streamlining operations, and enabling personalized medicine. Its potential spans medical imaging, drug discovery, surgical robotics, virtual health assistants, and remote patient monitoring. AI is also empowering patients by providing personalized, plain-language health information and decision support, enabling more informed choices about treatment options. It facilitates proactive health management through continuous monitoring via wearables, personalized medication reminders, and symptom tracking. AI-driven tools can also improve health literacy with interactive educational content, support of navigation of the healthcare system via chatbots, and connection to peer support networks, ultimately shifting the dynamic to one where patients are more active partners in their care.
However, alongside these advancements, significant challenges persist. Key pitfalls include biases in AI algorithms due to limited or skewed training data, which can amplify disparities in patient care. Privacy concerns and ethical issues arise with the use of sensitive health data, while the lack of regulatory frameworks hampers widespread adoption. Additionally, the integration of AI into clinical workflows can face resistance from healthcare professionals due to fear of automation or technical complexity. Despite these challenges, AI’s transformative potential in improving accuracy, accessibility, and efficiency in healthcare and empowering patients remains substantial. Addressing these pitfalls through equitable data practices, robust regulation, and clinician training will be critical to ensuring AI’s responsible and impactful deployment in healthcare systems worldwide.
About the Speaker:
Michelle Hermiston is the Dean of the College of Health Sciences at VinUniversity in Hanoi, Vietnam where she is tasked with building infrastructure for cutting edge health research and leading development and implementation of innovative health sciences education. Prior to moving to Vietnam, she spent 23 years at UCSF where she served as a pediatric hematologist-oncologist, Director of the Pediatric Immunotherapy Program, Director of the Core Inquiry Curriculum in the UCSF School of Medicine and Associate Director of the Helen Diller Comprehensive Cancer Center Global Cancer Program (HDCC GCP) where she led their efforts in Vietnam and Southeast Asia. Currently, in addition to her role as Dean, she serves as the Senior Advisor for Education for SIOP North America and Senior Advisor to the HDCC GCP.