GE's health unit wins first FDA clearance for A.I.-powered X-ray system

The Food and Drug Administration has cleared a new artificial intelligence-powered X-ray device that maker GE Healthcare says reduces the time to detect a collapsed lung from eight hours to as little as 15 minutes, the company announced Thursday. The device, called the Critical Care Suite, uses AI algorithms to scan X-ray images and detect pneumothorax, a deadly condition more commonly known as a collapsed lung that affects roughly 74,000 Americans each year. "The health-care industry is producing huge amounts of data from images to digital health records," GE Healthcare CEO Kieran Murphy said in an interview with CNBC ahead of the announcement. "We strongly believe that you have to turn that data into information and insight to improve outcomes." GE Healthcare, a dominant player in hospital and lab equipment, said its goal is to integrate AI into every aspect of the health-care system to ultimately "improve patient outcomes, reduce waste and inefficiencies, and eliminate costly errors."