8The British government signaled its continuing support for the increased utilization of AI in the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) with the recent announcement of the winners of the second wave of the NHS AI Lab’s AI in Health and Care Award.
At the tech-focused CogX Festival in London, Health and Social Care Secretary Matt Hancock named 38 projects, including development of an AI-guided tool to help doctors and nurses to diagnose heart attacks more accurately, an algorithm to fast-track the detection of lung cancer, an AI-powered mental health app to help tackle symptoms of anxiety and depression while also identifying people experiencing severe mental health difficulties, and tech to help detect undiagnosed spinal fractures.
In his remarks, Hancock said, “The 38 projects we are backing reflect the UK’s trailblazing approach to innovation in the healthcare sector, and could help us take a leap forward in the quality of care and the speed of disease diagnoses and treatment in the NHS.”
The AI in Health and Care Award aims to accelerate the testing and evaluation of AI in the NHS so patients can benefit from faster and more personalized diagnosis and greater efficiency in screening services.
According to NHS, over 17,000 stroke patients and over 25,000 patients with diabetes or high blood pressure have already benefited from the first round of the AI in Health and Care Award since September, where £50 million was given to 42 AI technologies. The new funding totals another £36 million of the overall £140 million AI in health and care award.
Echoing Hancock’s remarks, Sir Simon Stevens, chief executive of NHS England, noted that “Through our NHS AI Lab we’re now backing a new generation of ground-breaking but practical solutions to some of the biggest challenges in healthcare. Precision cancer diagnosis, accurate surgery, and new ways of offering mental health support are just a few of the promising real world patient benefits. . . So today our message to developers worldwide is clear – the NHS is ready to help you test your innovations and ensure our patients are among the first in the world to benefit from new AI technologies.”
The AI award package also includes funding to support the research, development and testing of early phase, promising ideas which could be used in the NHS in future, including AI for use in home monitoring equipment to predict sudden dips in the health of cystic fibrosis patients, AI used to measure the volume of brain tumors from scans to assess which are at risk of growth to ensure those patients are monitored more frequently, and tapping data from 20 years of previous kidney transplants to improve the decision-making process for patients waiting for kidneys.
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