Ethical and Acceptability Considerations for Integrating AI-Based Perceptual Computing in Clinical Care: What do Physicians Think?
Friday, October 13, 2023
3:15 PM – 4:30 PM ET
Location: Dover C (Third Floor)
Emerging perceptual computing (PC) technologies (e.g. digital phenotyping, affecting computing, and other forms of computer vision) are increasingly able to recognize and interpret human affect and certain markers of health and disease by taking in continuous data on both verbal and nonverbal behavior. These AI-mediated technologies are already being integrated into clinical care, first in psychiatry and now in areas of medicine as diverse as cardiology, pain management, reproductive health and many others; however, ethical guidelines for implementation are lacking, as well as insights into conditions for stakeholders’ willingness to use such technologies. We present qualitative findings from physician interviews conducted via an NCATS-funded research project examining ethical and practical considerations for ethically translating PC into clinical care. Preliminary data reveal that physicians are concerned about using PC systems that remain imperfect classifiers of disease states or dimensions, and stress the importance of keeping physicians’ (human) evaluations central in clinical care. However, physicians highlight the strong potential for PC systems to complement their understanding of changes in patient’s health status over time and to provide more objective measures of functioning outside clinical settings. Physicians said that acceptability of PC depends on interpretable and actionability of PC metrics are and the extent to which patients can offer informed consent to data collection using PC technologies. These findings highlight targets for responsible integration and uptake of PC into clinical care.
Meghan Hurley – Research Assistant, Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Baylor College of Medicine; Eric Storch, Ph.D. – McIngvale Presidential Endowed Chair & Professor, Menninger Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Baylor College of Medicine; John Herrington, Ph.D. – Psychologist, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia; Kristin Kostick-Quenet, Ph.D. – Assistant Professor, Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy, Baylor College of Medicine