Healthcare Leadership Council Calls for Responsible AI, Shares Industry Achievements
WASHINGTON, DC, May 7, 2024 — The Healthcare Leadership Council (HLC), the leading health industry association representing all disciplines of American healthcare, yesterday issued a comprehensive response to Representative Ami Bera’s Request for Information regarding the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the healthcare industry. The healthcare industry looks forward to harnessing the tremendous and growing potential of AI to revolutionize patient care, improve outcomes, and reduce costs while emphasizing the importance of patient safety, privacy, and equity.
HLC encourages the integration of AI to optimize our healthcare system and provide high-quality care accessible to all Americans. The response addresses three key aspects of Representative Bera’s request, highlighting innovative examples from member companies utilizing AI to serve patients.
- Implementation: HLC emphasizes that AI serves to augment rather than replace human elements in healthcare delivery. Additionally, AI streamlines patient engagement, improves communication, and enhances drug discovery processes.
- Efficacy, Accuracy, and Transparency: The response underscores the importance of establishing a risk-based approach and clear communication in utilizing AI. Disclosing inner-workings of AI systems would not prove to be beneficial to patients, providers, or payers. However, advancing standards for model transparency will ensure broader stakeholder understanding of the implications of AI-assisted decisions.
- Ethical and Regulatory Considerations: HLC asserts that AI has the potential to improve equity in healthcare by leveraging high-quality data. The response addresses regulatory challenges, emphasizing the integration of privacy principles and data governance in AI tools, and aligning existing healthcare laws and regulations.
In addition, HLC highlighted support for a risk-based regulatory framework developed at the federal level to preempt conflicting state laws, while facilitating compliance and encouraging innovation in AI applications. HLC appreciates the opportunity to respond to the RFI and is eager to engage in the development of thoughtful policies to advance the utilization of AI in improving patient safety and care.
