In an effort to develop more coordinated efforts towards the use of AI across Singapore’s healthcare sector, SingHealth, the island city-state’s largest group of healthcare institutions, and Singapore Innovate have signed a three-year partnership to advance the development and adoption of AI and other emerging technologies to enhance diagnostics, treatment, healthcare delivery and clinical outcomes.
Funded by Singapore's Ministry of Finance, SGInnovate is an investment firm that focuses on deep tech startups. According to reports, the new partnership will focus on three main areas: advancing AI thought leadership; supporting the growth and innovation of startups in health and biomedical sciences; and building a health innovation talent pool.
"With the breadth and depth of SingHealth’s clinical capabilities and patient data, we aim to synergise with SGInnovate’s access to deep tech communities and resources to develop innovative solutions that improve care delivery and clinical outcomes,” said SingHealth Group CEO Ivy Ng. “This new partnership will be strategic in equipping our healthcare innovators to advance AI in health and catalyse the process of translating novel ideas from bench to bedside.”
To nurture AI thought leadership, a Community of Practice will be set up that regularly connects both organizations' networks. This includes quarterly AI and Digital Innovation Journal Clubs and a yearly AI in Health workshop.
In addition, education and engagement initiatives, such as panels, roundtables and reverse pitches, will be promoted to support the startups' growth and innovations. In particular, the reverse pitches will provide a platform where clinicians and healthcare leaders can present to technology startups their disease and clinical workflow innovation needs. The partners will also identify "technically and clinically robust" AI health initiatives and connect them to strategic collaborators in the industry.
In the announcement, Ong Ye Kung, Singapore's health minister, noted that Singapore's healthcare industry already has been running various initiatives that use AI, according to Ong. For instance, Changi General Hospital and Integrated Health Information Systems (IHiS) jointly developed a deep-learning system to estimate the likelihood a patient might develop severe pneumonia based on an automated assessment of chest X-rays. This allowed early intervention from doctors.
Moving forward, the collaborative will also work with various biomedical ecosystem stakeholders, including venture capitalists and multinational firms, to develop on-the-job training opportunities for talents.
"This partnership will combine the unique strengths of SingHealth and SGInnovate to harness the vast potential in technology and innovation. And indeed, we are at the cusp of a revolution in healthcare technology," Ong also said during the signing of the memorandum of understanding.
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