Artificial intelligence has the potential to become a cost-effective industry standard in gastroenterology.
Austin Chiang, MD, chief medical officer of the gastrointestinal department at Medtronic, spoke with Becker’s on April 29 to discuss how AI could be the next cost-effective industry standard for sensing.
Editor’s Note: Answers have been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Question: Do you think AI will become an industry standard for detection in the next few years?
Dr. Austin Chiang: Absolutely. I think, especially when it comes to technology that induces minimal additional risk to the patient, it will certainly help to facilitate detection. I always think of when there is an additional tool to help doctors do these things, if I had to [receive] a procedure, would I rather not have it or would I rather have an extra set of eyes to help the doctor with the procedure? I think the other thing is that when I think of other areas or other specialties, AI is already transforming those areas. [There are] other areas where we’ve seen some transformation in pathology or radiology, so GI certainly needs to be included in this whole movement.
Q: How do you see the impact of AI colonoscopy screening on the economy if it becomes the norm?
THAT : The point of screening colonoscopy is that if we can catch things earlier and potentially prevent colorectal cancer, we can reduce a lot of the downstream costs related to colon cancer. So if we can prevent patients from having big, complex surgeries or very expensive treatments, it will save the health care system a lot of money. It really increases our prevention efforts and reduces costs that way.
