GE Healthcare and the University of Oxford-led U.K. National Consortium of Intelligent Medical Imaging (NCIMI) announced on 15 June that they are collaborating to create artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to help clinicians diagnose and manage patients with COVID-19 pneumonia.
In a trial approved by the U.K.'s Health Research Authority, GE and NCIMI will develop and test imaging and vital signs algorithms that can detect COVID-19 pneumonia and predict which patients might develop severe respiratory distress, a risk factor for mortality and long-term lung function problems.
The algorithms will be designed using medical imaging, laboratory, and clinical data from thousands of patients in the NCIMI NHS partner hospitals database and National COVID-19 Chest Imaging Database. Then, researchers from Oxford will use the algorithms to study COVID-19 pneumonia and evaluate whether the software aids in patient management, including triage, acute monitoring, interventions, discharge, and follow-up.
In another announcement issued on 15 June, GE Healthcare said it is working with the public hospital system in Paris, AP-HP, on a research project to create a thoracic imaging database of patients suspected of having COVID-19. Led by Prof. Marie-Pierre Revel, head of the cardiothoracic imaging unit at Cochin Hospital in Paris.
The data collected will provide an unprecedented database in France to expand knowledge of this disease and to evaluate the contribution of artificial intelligence in the diagnosis and prognosis of the disease, the vendor stated. The project aims to compile data from around 10,000 thoracic scans performed for suspected COVID-19 cases to better understand patients’ responses and develop tools to automatically assess disease severity.
