AI now sees and hears COVID in your lungs

For Dr Mary-Anne Hartley, a medical doctor and researcher in EPFL's intelligent Global Health group (iGH), 2020 has been relentless. "It's not a relaxing time to study infectious diseases," she explained. Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr Hartley's research team has been working non-stop with nearby Swiss university hospitals on two major projects. Using artificial intelligence (AI), they have developed new algorithms that, with data from ultrasound images and auscultation (chest/lung) sounds, can accurately diagnose the novel coronavirus in patients and predict how ill they are likely to become. "We've named the new deep learning algorithms DeepChest – using lung ultrasound images – and DeepBreath – using breath sounds from a digital stethoscope. This AI is helping us to better understand complex patterns in these fundamental clinical exams. So far, results are highly promising," said Professor Jaggi.