The Medical AI Podcast

Responsible AI is a much vaunted concept that aims to connect AI with human rights, equality and fairness. Whocould argue with that? Well there are plenty of critics who complain that in practice, restrictions of these kind only stifle innovation and progress. And in accepting such restrictions we risk delivering outcomes that are worse. With Dr Heather Bassett, the Chief Medical Officer of Xsolis...

Agentic AI systems are causing a huge buzz right now. These are AI systems that actively make changes in the world as opposed to merely giving information. In healthcare, could agentic AI systems help address the huge problem of preventable disease ? This is an economic drain that is huge and unnecessary represents around 30% of personal healthcare costs in the US. With Eugene Sayan of Softheon. T...

Video calls to your doctor from your home, is old news and very 2021. But what if you could have a consultation with your doctor from home, which involved YOU performing physical exams yourself, AND as accurately as with an in-person visit? This is what new AI-guided tools claim to be already delivering. This could potntially mean a drastic easing on healthcare systems and better outcomes for peop...

Normally on this amazing podcast I cover AI systems that can help with medical treatment. Today we are discussing an angle on the harms of AI on health. With me to discuss is doyen of the art world and AI provocateuse, the amazing and wonderful Gretchen Andrew In particular, we look at whether are AI tools are providing a particualrly pernicious and powerful way in which our perceptions of beauty...

Scary fact: fertility rates across the West have plummeted to alarmingly low levels, marking a significant demographic shift. Most Western countries now have a Total Fertility Rate (TFR) well below the 'replacement level' of approximately 2.1 children per woman—the rate needed to maintain a population size without migration. For instance, the European Union's TFR hit a historical low o...

Could AI help you be a sexual superhero? (And reduce your cardiovascular risk) Use the coupon code: FELIX15 for a 15% discount when they make a purchase through our website. You can log in to your affiliate account and check all assigned coupons on Dashboard here: https://af.uppromote.com/myfirmtech/login Erectile dysfunction may not be life-threatening but it is no doubt life-worsening. Does AI h...

Have you ever been dropped into the divine realm, the ultimate substrate of all reality? Have you ever given birth to yourself infinite times? Or felt connected to the entire universe in a way which is spiritually life-changing? If the answer to any of these questions is yes, you've probably been on mind-altering drugs, or psychedelics, like LSD or psilocibin. Remarkably, there is growing evid...

Brain-computer interfaces are for some, medical technology bordering on the miraculous. Elon Musk’s neuralink is, for example, promising to cure some cases of blindness and paralysis. It has even been suggested that brain-computer interfaces could help humans become "superhuman": theycould dramatically boost human cognition and even help people become telepathic. On the other hand, scien...

Let’s imagine a utopian future of medical AI. Implantsand wearables constantly monitor your health. AI systems process those health data in real time and recommend any treatments, combining those data with those from your genome. Recommended drugs, naturally, are more efficacious and cheaper than those from 2025. life expectancy will be 100 and old age will be longer, healthier and groovier than e...

In Blade Runner Rick Deckard, meets Rachel. She is very beautiful and vulnerable, with a rich life narrative, andemotional depth. However, Rachel is a highly sophisticated, super-realistic android. But nonetheless he falls in love with her. How close are we to this vision of the future? Are there medical uses to companion robots? And are there hidden dangers? And what about you? - Could you fall i...

Under capitalism a company has to make money. But a big problem in medical AI is that few companies are. Most are burning up venture capital and profitability is very hard to achieve. A key reason is that it is extremely difficult to obtain government reimbursement for the use of medical AI products. But a small number of companies are making progress here. What can learned from them? And how woul...

Microscopic analysis of tissue slides, or pathology, is a vital diagnostic tool. It can determine disease type and stage and it remains the gold standard approach for diagnostics in cancer. But the process is labor-intensive and dependent on the skill of the pathologist. AI techniques could address those problem and are rapidly changing pathology analysis. Buthow exactly? What does the future look...

We are all aware now of the outrageous power of Large language Models, or LLMs, such as Grok, Gemini and chatGTP. And ever since they exploded onto the scene in late 2022 there has been a scramble to implement them into health care products. However there’s a big problem. They can hallucinate like a Timothy Leary on a cocktail of peyote, LSD and ayahuasca. Except that … these hallucinations can lo...

AI and heart attack risk, with Ben Tasker, AI Dean of Southern New Hampshire University. In the US over a million people per year will need urgent life saving treatment for a heart attack. But these treatments are risky for the patient and can be potentially fatal. How can AI help predict potential adverse events to treatment and help mitigate those risks. The Medical AI Podcast is the number one...

Imagine you’ve just been diagnosed with a serious heart condition. You will need a carefully crafted care plan. This will help manage your medications, appointments, and lifestyle changes…. But then imagine you’re caught up in the gears of a dysfunctional health system, these could mean the difference between life and death. How common are these kinds of issues? And how could AI help? With Dr Aki...

Donald Trump - Many love him, many hate him. But … few would disagree that his second administration, only 100 days in, has already brought in political change that is truly radical One key example is that there are now people with a strong deregulation agenda - in key roles in the US government. And the single biggest question in medical AI right now – is what will be the impact – both in the US...

It’s widely assumed that drug treatment is a miracle of modern science. However, it’s equally arguable that modern drug treatment is a very expensive disaster, with serious consequences for public health. For example, a drug typically takes 10-12 years to develop and the cost is as high as $2.5 billion. And yet despite that, 90% of drug candidates fail to gain approval. And, especially for chronic...

Episode 53: Radiology AI: Roadblocks and how to get past them. With Professor Paul Chang. A recent study by McKinney and colleagues showed that deep learning AI systems outperformed human radiologists for detection of breast cancer. Except that this wasn't so recent... it was in fact published in January 2020, over 5 years ago. While AI screening is growing it still only accounts for around 10...

One of the greatest health challenges for western countries is obesity. Why is that an issue? Obesity increases the risk of all major diseases including heart disease, cancer, dementia, and diabetes. What role is AI playing in addressing this? With Dr Sera Lavelle, Clinical Psychologist. The Medical AI Podcast is a top-rated podcast on FeedSpot. Check out other FeedSpot podcasts here: ⁠https://pod...

Radiology could be the most important area of medical AI. Most FDA approvals in medical AI are for radiology – with almost 1000 approvals since 2017. So radiology is undergoing a major AI transformation. But the abundance of radiology AI tools has created a big problem. With so much choice, healthcare providers are often confused about ◦ which tools to deploy ◦ how to deploy them ◦ how they will w...

Episode 50: AI and the non-invasive "brain biopsy" (1H-MRS) with Professor Alex Lin of Harvard Medical School Imagine a doctor telling you you need a biopsy. Then he or she tells you the biopsy is going to be from your brain. You might well panic. But then you learn that there will be no drilling through the skull. This is a non-invasive biopsy. It uses a technique known as H-MRS and it...

The classic American TV series Six Million Dollar Man followed the story of Steve Austin, who had to be rebuilt after near-fatal injuries in a plane crash. He was Better than he was before… Better...stronger...faster." Prosthetic limbs have been helping people for many years even centuries but what is the state-of-the-art? How is it helping amputees? And how far can the technology take us tow...

Skin cancer is one of the most common forms of cancer globally, with millions of cases diagnosed each year. Its prevalence is rising due to factors like increased sun exposure, aging populations, and lifestyle changes. The main types of skin cancer include melanoma, basal cell carcinoma (BCC), and squamous cell carcinoma (SCC), with melanoma being the deadliest. Early detection is crucial for succ...

One of the landmarks in AI was the work on neural networks in the 1970s by Geoffrey Hinton, the "Godfather of AI". This work took place at the University of Edinburgh. This laid much of the groundwork for the plethora of modern AI-based applications so academia and the corporate sector are two very different but essential types of crucible for AI research what is a relationship between them? Is it...

Longevity and immortality is a key theme in the earliest literature. But what does modern science have to offer to life extension? And in particular, has AI added anything new? With Felix is someone who is actively involved in this field, Dr Cory Goldberg.