- Dr. Katherine Pannel writes that the current use of AI in Mississippi’s healthcare sector is proving to be transformative and holds enormous potential.
As with any other critical industry today, technological innovations in the healthcare sector are expanding our ability to diagnose, treat, and heal patients in Mississippi. And just like the rest of the country, artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly becoming an emerging technology that is changing the way we keep Mississippians healthy.
To successfully adopt and apply artificial intelligence for our state’s healthcare system, it’s crucial that our medical professionals receive the education and training necessary to successfully use it. This is being addressed at the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC), which is integrating AI into its curriculum to support students in critical tasks like making diagnoses and developing plans of care.
The addition of AI into UMMC’s program has elevated future professionals’ hands-on experience in the classroom and accelerated professors’ abilities to transfer knowledge in their courses. It has also aided faculty by automating time consuming processes, allowing for more personalized and effective teaching, and ultimately enabling instructors to focus more of their time and attention on students. Across the board, AI is making medical education in Mississippi more effective.
At our state’s hospitals, AI is already being deployed to improve efficiency and ease the burden on our nurses and doctors. At the small, rural King’s Daughters Medical Center in Brookhaven, for example, AI is successfully being used to automate medication reconciliation processes entirely in the background. This simple deployment of AI has improved the accuracy of patient medication records, decreased patient treatment delays, and eased the amount of time that hospital staff spend on administrative work, freeing them up to treat even more patients.
The current use of AI in Mississippi’s healthcare sector is proving to be transformative and holds enormous potential. Luckily, significant support exists for future research, particularly in the mental health space. Earlier this year, Alphabet’s health company Verily and pharmaceutical manufacturer Otsuka initiated a study on the possible applications of AI to enhance mental health care. With more than 430,000 adults in Mississippi diagnosed with a mental health condition, 120,000 of which have a serious mental illness, one hopes that AI will play a major role in improving our state’s collective mental health as well.
Having already demonstrated its positive impacts across our state’s healthcare sector, and its capacity to help address our citizens’ mental health needs, it’s critical that AI innovation continues to receive support from lawmakers both in Jackson and Washington, D.C. As with any emerging technology, there are valid concerns about its ethical and appropriate use, but there should be no question that its ability to save lives should be a key consideration as our state legislature develops any regulatory policy.
Artificial intelligence is poised to have a dramatic impact on the future of healthcare, from training the next generation of care providers to enhancing diagnoses, care, medication distribution, and medical research capabilities. The Magnolia State is already taking on a crucial role in driving this change and is well-positioned to continue its trend of success. With our educational institutions, health systems, and lawmakers working together, we can continue to drive an AI-powered transformation of healthcare that will keep Mississippians happier and healthier than we ever thought possible.
Katherine Pannel
