Virtual summit addresses artificial intelligence and racial bias in health care
The virtual summit “Held to the Light” brings speakers together to address bias in artificial intelligence (AI) in health care. They aim to find solutions that involve communities and hold people accountable.
The Wayne State University School of Medicine.
The Collaborative to End Race-Based Medicine-Detroit and Wayne State University’s Office of Inclusive Excellence are holding an online summit this month. They will discuss how bias affects health care and public health in the age of artificial intelligence.
Dr. Ijeoma Nnodim Opara is an associate professor of internal medicine and pediatrics at Wayne State University School of Medicine. She is also a co-chair of the collaborative.
She says AI can be useful, but it can also make bias in health care and decision-making worse. This can lead to poorer health outcomes.
“It has the potential to make bias much worse, and we are already seeing this happen. It can greatly increase, spread or strengthen the effects of bias built into computer code used for medical tools and decisions,” she says.
The collaborative wants to end the use of race-based medicine in medical care, teaching and research. It also hopes to help shape new education policies and research while making sure community members have a voice.
“We need to talk about it and work out how to reduce this risk. Otherwise, it will cause widespread harm,” she says.
Race-based medicine is based on the idea that race is a social category created by people, not a biological category. Racism in medicine can lead to poor health outcomes, especially for Black people.
The collaborative was previously called the Wayne State University School of Medicine’s Detroit End Race-Based Medicine Taskforce.
“If we do not clearly name this problem and deal with it, it will keep happening. We still teach it in medical schools. We use it in medical care, and it appears in our research and affects policy,” she says.
Opara says the collaborative was formed because of the high number of COVID-19 deaths in African American and Black communities, which were linked to false and misleading information.
She says the collaborative holds workshops, roundtable meetings and discussions. This year, it is hosting the event “Held to the Light: Race, Code & Consequence in the Age of AI” on October 29, from 3 to 5 p.m. Register here.