Objective: The aim of this study was to build an effective co-reference resolution system tailored for the biomedical domain. Materials and Methods: Experiment materials used in this study is provided by the 2011 i2b2 Natural Language Processing Challenge. The 2011 i2b2 challenge involves coreference resolution in medical documents. Concept mentions have been annotated in clinical texts, and the mentions that co-refer in each document are to be linked by coreference chains. Normally, there are two ways of constructing a system to automatically discover co-referent links. One is to manually build rules for co-reference resolution, and the other category of approaches is to use machine learning systems to learn automatically from training datasets and then perform the resolution task on testing datasets. Results: Experiments show the existing co-reference resolution systems are able to find some of the co-referent links, and our rule based system performs well finding the majority of the co-referent links. Our system achieved 89.6% overall performance on multiple medical datasets. Conclusion: The experiment results show that manually crafted rules based on observation of training data is a valid way to accomplish high performance in this coreference resolution task for the critical biomedical domain.

Medical workers are our heroes as the COVID-19 outbreak continues with deaths and confirmed cases rising. A CNN survey found that healthcare systems are coming under strain because of the increasing number of patients infected by the coronavirus. Partners Healthcare is supporting patients in the COVID-19 outbreak by using AI to detect those infected and those showing signs of the virus. Healthcare workers at Partners Healthcare understand the current crisis because of high patient numbers experienced and are working round the clock. One question that comes to mind as COVID-19 pandemic continues is: How responsible is the current use of AI to combat the outbreak?

We've made our coronavirus coverage free for all readers. To get all of HBR's content delivered to your inbox, sign up for the Daily Alert newsletter. On Monday March 9, in an effort to address soaring patient demand in Boston, Partners HealthCare went live with a hotline for patients, clinicians, and anyone else with questions and concerns about Covid-19. The goals are to identify and reassure the people who do not need additional care (the vast majority of callers), to direct people with less serious symptoms to relevant information and virtual care options, and to direct the smaller number of high-risk and higher-acuity patients to the most appropriate resources, including testing sites, newly created respiratory illness clinics, or in certain cases, emergency departments. As the hotline became overwhelmed, the average wait time peaked at 30 minutes.

Today during the 2019 World Innovation Forum, Partners HealthCare unveiled its selections for the fifth annual "Disruptive Dozen," an annual list of 12 emerging artificial intelligence (AI) technologies with the greatest potential to impact healthcare in the next year. The annual 12 most disruptive technologies are selected through a rigorous process by Partners HealthCare thought leaders, clinicians, and researchers. Interview results from nearly 100 experts are assembled into a field of nominated technologies. The nominated innovation must have a strong potential for significant clinical impact at some point in the next decade and offers significant patient benefit in comparison to current practices. The innovation may also have a significant benefit to the delivery/efficiency of health.

FUJIFILM SonoSite, Inc. has announced the launch of a strategic relationship with Partners HealthCare to apply artificial intelligence to improve the utility and functionality of portable ultrasound. The two organizations will collaborate to enhance ultrasound technology with AI to enable clinicians to perform scans at the point-of-care, further expanding the accessibility of this technology for clinicians and their patients. The collaboration will be executed through the MGH & BWH Center for Clinical Data Science and leverage the extensive data assets, computational infrastructure and clinical expertise of the Partners HealthCare system. Allowing for even greater integration of ultrasound into our healthcare delivery system requires smarter machines. In emergency settings, the efficiency and cost-effectiveness of portable ultrasound makes is a critical companion to other imaging modalities." The first project under the collaboration will target some of the more complex emergency medicine procedures using AI enabled portable ultrasound. Andrew Liteplo, MD, MGH Department of Emergency Medicine, explains, "If we build scanners that can be used by non-expert users both inside and outside the hospital, we can likely reduce the time delay between trauma and diagnosis, which will translate to more rapid interventions and improved outcomes." Diku Mandavia, MD, FACEP, FRCPC, Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer of FUJIFILM SonoSite emphasizes, "This collaboration is really focused on embedding AI in portable ultrasound with the goal of providing assistance in 2D image interpretation along with the automation of measurements and calculations - the type of automation that will allow us to increase the accessibility of this critical technology while still delivering high diagnostic value." FUJIFILM SonoSite introduced ultrasound systems designed for use at the point of care to the healthcare system over 20 years ago. We have always listened carefully to our customers to ensure their needs are being met and I am proud that we will be able to offer them AI enhanced technology to expand their utilization of ultrasound, increasing the quality of care they can provide while saving our healthcare system money."

At the World Medical Innovation Forum this week, participants were polled with a loaded question: "Do you think healthcare will become better or worse from the use of AI?" Across the respondents, 98 percent said it would be either "Better" or "Much Better" and not a single one thought it would become "Much Worse." This is an interesting statistic, and the results were not entirely surprising, especially given that artificial intelligence was the theme for the meeting. This continual stream of adoption of new technologies in both clinical and post clinical settings is remarkable. Today, healthcare is a technology operation. As a case in point, outside of the array of MDs and medical professionals presenting at the forum, there was clearly a strong, advanced technology thread weaved throughout the conversations of the traditional topics of pathology, radiology, bioinformatics, electronic medical records (EMR), and standard healthcare provider issues.

It's one thing to track your heart rate, pulse or other movements with a smart watch or other consumer electronics, researchers say, but quite another to rely on the device to diagnose a disease. It's one thing to track your heart rate, pulse or other movements with a smart watch or other consumer electronics, researchers say, but quite another to rely on the device to diagnose a disease. With sensors that can collect data on body movements, heart rate, blood pressure and other metrics, the list of health trackers that go beyond activity trackers like Fitbits gets longer each year. "There's definitely an explosion of these things," says Dr. Joseph Kvedar, the vice president for connected health at Partners HealthCare in Boston, and an associate professor of dermatology at Harvard Medical School. Some of these devices will lead to a better health care system, Kvedar predicts, with cheaper, more efficient care.

The center is only about a year old, but it has already built important capabilities. Its goal is not basic research, but improving clinical practice within the two hospitals and the healthcare system in general. According to the CCDS Executive Director, Dr. Mark Michalski, in order for this technology to actually affect care there are several key prerequisites: Industry partnerships: For-profit companies dominate both the medical technology and information technology industries, so it's important for a research center to have beneficial collaborations with external firms. Early in its short history, the CCDS established a ten-year collaboration with GE Healthcare, a major producer of medical imaging equipment that is now headquartered in Boston. This strategic partnership will focus on two major areas. The other area is to identify and develop applications that span radiology, pathology, and population health.

It's kind of a no-brainer that Dr. Keith Dreyer would be among those who lead the advance of artificial intelligence into healthcare. Dreyer is a rare breed, a radiologist who teaches at Harvard Medical School, but he also holds a degree in mathematics and has a doctorate in computer science. So it's fitting that Dreyer serves as the chief data science officer at Partners HealthCare, a healthcare network that includes Brigham and Women's Hospital and Massachusetts General Hospital, two of America's most prestigious medical institutions. Earlier this year, Partners and GE Healthcare signed a 10-year agreement to "integrate artificial intelligence into every aspect of the patient journey." A hospital generates some 50 petabytes of data per year on average, enough to fill 20 million four-drawer filing cabinets with standard pages of text.

Boston medical giant Partners HealthCare will dole out half a million dollars to local researchers developing treatments and cures for deadly diseases using cutting-edge artificial intelligence?