AI in Healthcare: Is your solution ethics-proof?
Download the Foresight into AI Ethics Toolkit for Healthcare Below.
Authors: Jessie Adamson, Julianna Charles, Alyssa Darden, Francisco Lee & Matthew Lowe
Why is there a need for an AI ethics lens in healthcare?
Healthcare is marked by high levels of ethical checkpoints. However, in an industry that is being permeated by efficient health information systems, consumer devices, and an explosion of AI-based solutions, there is a widening gap between “known” and “unknown” ethical dilemmas and quandaries which are bound to become increasingly complex over the next decade as we continue to see growth in this area.
Unlike other industries, healthcare is governed by existing ethical bodies, including research and medical ethics. As shown in Figure 1, AI ethics occupies a unique place in the design and implementation of new AI algorithms. In addition to the existence of medical ethics which gives patients confidence in their healthcare provider’s decision-making capacity, healthcare providers should also be able to trust in the AI technologies they use.
Figure 1: AI Ethics’ Unique Values
What has ORI done to help meet this need?
The Foresight into AI Ethics (FAIE) toolkit was developed by the Open Roboethics Institute (ORI) to assist organizations in building an ethics roadmap that is tailored to fit the needs of the industry. This past year, ORI partnered with a group of graduate students from the University of Toronto’s Master of Health Informatics (MHI) program to identify healthcare’s unique ethical considerations surrounding the use of AI, and to tailor the original FAIE toolkit to meet those healthcare-specific needs through the use of a healthcare example to help users relate scenarios to their own organizations. The intent of the updated FAIE toolkit is to help healthcare organizations explore project risks and shine a light on the unknown implications of the AI technology in their specific context. This will allow healthcare leaders to produce AI technologies that are both safe and effective for patients and providers.
Now what?
AI has immense potential to change the way we deliver healthcare and the rate of growth and innovation in this space can be astounding. When it comes to improving patient outcomes and relieving physician burnout, it’s unsurprising that practitioners and organizations might be quick to jump on an opportunity to deploy a new AI-based solution that has the potential to result in these desirable outcomes. However, regardless of how great the perceived benefits of adopting new AI-based technology may seem, as with any innovation in healthcare, ethical considerations should be rigorously examined from the get-go. The updated Foresight into AI Ethics in Healthcare (FAIE-H) toolkit is our initial attempts to reduce the barrier for healthcare organizations to find value in foreseeing the downstream implications of implementing an AI-enabled solution.
Check out the new FAIE-H to ensure that your AI healthcare project is developed with foreseeable ethical considerations in mind. We warmly welcome any feedback about your initial perception of the toolkit and suggestions you may have for further modifications.
ORI would like to thank the instructors and students of the Masters of Health Informatics program at the University of Toronto for their invaluable contribution.
