As the Rush Toward AI in Healthcare Continues, Explainability is Crucial

Artificial intelligence is seeing a massive amount of interest in healthcare, with scores of hospitals and health systems already have deployed the technology – more often than not on the administrative side – to great success.But success with AI in the healthcare setting – especially on the clinical side – can't happen without addressing the growing concerns around models' transparency and explainability. In a field where decisions can mean life or death, being able to understand and trust AI decisions isn't just a technical need – it's an ethical must.Neeraj Mainkar is vice president of software engineering and advanced technology at Proprio, which develops immersive tools for surgeons. He has considerable expertise in applying algorithms in healthcare. Healthcare IT News spoke with him to discuss explainability, and the need for patient safety and trust, error identification, regulatory compliance and ethical standards in AI.