Too much AI has big drawbacks for doctors -- and their patients

Artificial intelligence in medical care is here to stay -- but it can do more harm than good, especially if those implementing it lose sight of the essential importance of a doctor's clinical judgment. As a primary-care physician, my job is to evaluate and re-evaluate a patient in an ongoing personalized way even the best AI could never attain. Here's an example: An 80-year-old patient of mine with chronic heart failure drank and ate too much on a recent Caribbean cruise and ended up in a hospital, his lungs filled with fluid. A cardiac echo revealed an ejection fraction (how well the heart is pumping) of only 15%. In fact, a recent study concluded AI might have assessed that ejection fraction better than the cardiologist who did so, and this assessment is clearly going to be an important role for AI. But the actual management of the patient went well beyond a simple number.