AI & Nigeria

Just finished a really fun session with our Primary Compassionate Care team on AI foundations and health applications. We covered the basics of how AI works, where it is already showing up in healthcare, and some of the risks around bias and fabricated outputs. And yes, we played “Name That AI Bias!” 😆

What I appreciated most, and always do, was the discussion we had around the use of AI within the healthcare and academic settings. The participants talked about the need to be disciplined in how we use AI, not just because the technology can be wrong, but because it is very easy to become overly reliant on the tool. We also described some of the advantages in using AI in the healthcare setting such as addressing the reams of paperwork.

They also raised an important point about culture. AI may be useful, but that doesn’t mean every patient or community will be comfortable with it being part of their care. We need to think about trust, communication, context, and whether the use of AI actually fits the person in front of us. Dr. Aisha Liman reinforced the need to be transparent with patients and to openly discuss any concerns a patient may raise about AI use.

For me, that is where these conversations get much more interesting and I find we actually learn more in the dialogue. As our knowledge and use of the technology continue to grow, so should the questions we ask of it and our attention to how it may be shifting the dynamic of care.

I’ve attached a few slides below on evaluating and adopting AI tools within the healthcare setting and an interesting article on the ethical oversight of AI in Nigerian healthcare. There are incredible opportunities in this area, especially in designing a regulatory framework that can standardize and guide us all on AI use.