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Elevate Magazine
October 21, 2024

Microsoft Launches AI Tools to Support Healthcare Workers

microsoft launches ai tools to support healthcare workers

Photo source: FedScoop

Last week, Microsoft announced a range of new artificial intelligence (AI) tools designed to alleviate the workload of healthcare professionals, including doctors and nurses. This tool includes advanced medical imaging models, a healthcare agent service, and an automated documentation solution to specifically assist nursing staff.

These features are intended to help healthcare organisations develop AI applications more efficiently and reduce the time clinicians spend on administrative tasks, which proves to be a significant contributor to industry burnout.

The tech giant previously introduced health features within its Azure cloud platform and acquired Nuance Communications for USD $16 billion in 2021.

Key Features of the New Tools

Healthcare AI Models

Microsoft is launching open-source multimodal AI models that analyse various data types beyond text, including medical images and genomic data. These models enable healthcare organisations to create tailored applications. For instance, a collaboration with Providence Health & Services led to a whole-slide model that enhances mutation prediction and cancer subtyping.

“Getting a whole-slide foundation model for pathology has been a challenge in the past, and now we’re actually able to do it. It was really sort of a game changer,” said Sara Vaezy from Providence.

Healthcare Agent Service

The new healthcare agent service allows organisations to create AI agents that assist with tasks such as answering questions and automating processes. Through Microsoft Copilot Studio, these agents come with healthcare-specific safeguards. For example, if an answer references clinical evidence, the source is provided.

Microsoft noted that these agents have been particularly useful for answering basic patient inquiries and assisting doctors with clinical guidelines.

Automated Documentation for Nurses

Microsoft’s partnership with Epic Systems will focus on developing an AI-powered documentation tool for nurses. This builds on Nuance’s DAX Copilot tool for doctors, which converts recorded patient visits into clinical notes.

Mary Varghese Presti, vice president of Portfolio Evolution and Incubation at Microsoft Health and Life Sciences, emphasised that “the nursing workflow is very different from that of physicians.” She also highlighted the need for solutions tailored to nurses’ specific tasks. 

Consequently, Microsoft is collaborating with institutions like Stanford Health Care and Northwestern Medicine to further refine this tool.