Why Now Is the Time for AI in Healthcare

Is this AI moment in healthcare really different from all the hype that came before?

In this clip from our episode “A Brief History of AI in Healthcare”, Lekan Wang, Partner at JSL Health Capital, makes his case for why the data is finally backing up the optimism.

Check out the full episode here

🎙️⚕️ABOUT LEKAN WANG
Lekan Wang is a partner at JSL Health Capital, an AI first healthcare investment fund that is joining with some of the cutting edge companies that are leveraging technology in advancing healthcare and  hopefully creating better outcomes at lower costs.

🎙️⚕️ABOUT CARETALK
CareTalk is a weekly podcast that provides an incisive, no B.S. view of the US healthcare industry. Join co-hosts John Driscoll (President U.S. Healthcare and EVP, Walgreens Boots Alliance) and David Williams (President, Health Business Group) as they debate the latest in US healthcare news, business and policy. 

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Transcript

John: 0:05

There's a, a reach of data and the internet plus the ability to build synthetic data or, or, or sort of create more data plus humans. The data piece is there, it's really a three part piece. The hardware is novel, much more powerful and much faster. Then you take those two components and you add a different way of architecting the learning, the, the ability to drive. To, to answer questions, drive insights, and that, and then that loops because it, it, it, it, you're, you're going back through the, the, the armies of humans back through the data, running it through bigger and bigger hardware, and that attention is all you need basically was a, a better model to actually. To, or Baylor architecture to build faster and more insightful models. And I, I think, I think those, no, I think that's a, that's, that's a, I don't think you're, I think that's exactly that, that, that created the moment we're in right now. That's awesome. Why is it relevant to healthcare?

Lekan: 1:11

Yeah, I mean, in healthcare, um, as you know, many, uh, may recall, like we, we've tried using, uh, you know, what we, we call AI in healthcare many times, right? Um, anywhere from the expert systems to, you know, we use a lot of graphical models and bays nest in the statistical era. Uh, and each time, you know. Been aspects of, uh, AI that's been promising, but really, really underdelivered. Um, and we also know that healthcare is an area that, uh, traditionally has been relatively low to relatively slow to adopt technology. Um. Today, I think we have a few big problems in healthcare. We have, uh, a surge in documentation and administration, and every clinician will tell you that they spend so much time doing documentation and, and administration. Um, there's what I would think of as almost competitive documentation and administration between payers, providers, and other entities as well. Uh, and also we have a huge access problem in healthcare too, right? I mean, I, I, I think for, for both you and me, we, we are in healthcare and sometimes, you know, I even have trouble understanding how to get the care I need and how to navigate my own care. Uh, so it, it's, it's really, really challenging to get here care, and, and I think with. The current wave of AI in healthcare for, for the first time. Um, and, and you know, I've, I've always been the person who, who's been an AI who's been a little skeptical of, you know, actually AI applications in the real world. I'm actually, for the first time, actually, extremely optimistic. About how AI can actually affect these huge problems in healthcare from, from, uh, decreasing administration to, uh, to increasing access to actually increasing the number of, uh, cures and treatments in, in healthcare as well. Uh, and this is actually being born in data too. This is not just, you know, uh, VCs, which I am one investing in healthcare is hoping that this is gonna come in seven years. There's actually real. You know, clinical data, third party validated data, showing that in many of these areas, AI is, uh, really, uh, really causing an improvement, um, of, of these things. This is not to say that, you know, AI will cure everything. It'll make everything better. We actually have to be quite careful about how we approach this. But, but overall, I think now is the time to be very optimistic in the use of AI in in, in healthcare.