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Call for Applications: The AI Health Equity Scholars Program

Duke AI Health and the Duke Clinical & Translational Science Institute are pleased to announce a call for applications with the AI Health Equity Scholars Program. This program will support a minimum 1-year appointment for a faculty member, staff member, or postdoctoral scholar at Duke University.  The AI Health Equity Scholars Program is a new initiative intended to broaden our commitment to ethical and equitable data science and artificial health (AI) applications, with direction from CTSI Director L. Ebony Boulware, MD, MHS, and AI Health Director Michael J. Pencina, PhD. The intention of this program is to broaden our expertise in considering and applying ethical and equitable principles for key initiatives within Duke AI Health. Applications must be submitted by Friday, December 10, 2021 by 10 PM (Eastern Time).

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Portrait of Duke AI Health Director Michael Pencina, PhD

Vice Dean for Data Science Michael Pencina, PhD, takes the role of Director for Duke AI Health

Given the rapid growth in and importance of harnessing health data as a tool, Mary Klotman, MD, Dean, Duke University School of Medicine, recently announced the key leadership appointment of Michael Pencina, PhD, Vice Dean for Data Science for the School of Medicine, as the Director of Duke AI Health effective October 13, 2021. Designed as a multidisciplinary initiative, AI Health intends to unlock the enormous opportunity to spur collaborations that will leverage knowledge and expertise from across campus.

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BLOG: Using Medical Records to Prepare Doctors and Patients for Difficult Conversations

Now more than ever, clinicians can access an incredible amount of data about their patients. Electronic health records (EHRs) offer a massive repository of information about each individual: notes of all kinds, laboratory results, imaging data, scanned forms, and saved images. Soon, we may even be able to add data from wearable devices such as personal fitness trackers into the mix. However, this breadth of information can be both a blessing and a curse. Clinicians can learn more about their patients from the medical chart than was previously possible—but only if they are able to rapidly and accurately sort through that information and find the most relevant points for a given clinical encounter.

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Illustration showing a robot-like hand reaching up to point at an abstract arrangement of glowing points and lines connecting them. Image credit: Tara Winstead/Pexels

Duke AI Health Director Pencina Joins Expert Panel for Discussion on AI Ethics

This December, Duke AI Health Director and Professor of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics Michael Pencina will join a group of experts for a panel discussion hosted by the Duke Alumni Forever Learning Institute called “Artificial Intelligence: Capabilities, Liabilities, and Responsibilities.” The discussion, the final installment in a four-part series taking place this fall titled “Artificial Intelligence: Real Ethical Quandaries,” will focus on the expanding role of artificial intelligence in decision-making and the practical and ethical issues that can arise from the use of a technology whose inner workings are often opaque and whose operations can be affected by built-in biases. Panel participants will examine how these technologies are being used in arenas such as medicine and national security and discuss the potential impacts of these tools, both positive and negative, on people’s daily lives. The session will take place as an online Zoom webinar on Tuesday, December 7, 2021, from 3:00-4:00 PM Eastern time, and will be moderated by Duke Law Professor and Director of the Duke Initiative for Science and Society Nita Farahany.

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“We Should Agree That Hackers Are the Immune System of the Internet”

Eric Perakslis, PhD, DCRI’s Chief Science & Digital Officer, will present at DEF CON 2021 in a talk called “Truth, Trust, and Biodefense.” Learn more about his presentation in his blog post for the DCRI below:

“On May 12, 2017, a ransomware cyberattack known as WannaCry was launched. Within a day, it was raging worldwide and had infected tens of thousands of computers and electronic devices belonging to the United Kingdom’s National Health Service, causing severe disruptions to hospital operations. Shortly after 15:00 UTC on May 13, the infection was halted when information security researcher and hacker Marcus Hutchins discovered and exploited a “kill switch” embedded in the malware’s code. In addition to greatly slowing WannaCry’s spread, this kill switch also prevented infected computers from being encrypted and their data locked.  Marcus Hutchins’ story is notably complex, but there is no denying that his actions greatly decreased the global harm that likely would have otherwise occurred. The term hacker often brings to mind a faceless, hooded figure that is ubiquitously linked to crime. Given how pervasive this image is, it may surprise some to learn that there are many “good” hackers. This distinction is made especially clear in the viral TED Talk given by cybersecurity Keren Elazari titled “Hackers: the internet’s immune system.” In this talk, Elazari argues that hackers make the internet stronger by testing its defenses, which forces the internet to adapt, improve, and strengthen, not unlike the body’s adaptive immune system.

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Portrait of Duke AI Health Director Michael Pencina, PhD

Duke AI Health Director Pencina Quoted in Article Spotlighting Predictive Clinical Algorithms

Duke AI Health Director Michael Pencina, PhD, who is a professor of biostatistics and bioinformatics at Duke and serves as the medical school’s vice dean for data science and information technology, was recently quoted in an article appearing in STAT News examining the use of commercially developed predictive algorithms in medicine. In an investigative report for STAT News, correspondent Casey Ross spoke with employees in multiple health systems across the country that use clinical algorithms created by Epic, one of the nation’s largest electronic health record vendors.

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Duke Rheumatologists Explore the Effects of a Rapid Transition to Telemedicine During the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has prompted a surge in demand for telehealth services, but many questions about how healthcare providers can adapt their practice to meet the challenges of telemedicine remain to be answered. Now, a group of rheumatologists at Duke University School of Medicine have used data drawn from the Duke University Health System’s EHRs (electronic health records) to investigate how a rapid transition to telemedicine affected their approach to patient care.

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Learning to DANNCE

A group of neuroscientists and machine learning experts are developing new ways to analyze animal movement and behavior to gain insights into the inner workings of the nervous system. Combining expertise from the disciplines of neurobiology and artificial intelligence, a team of researchers from Duke University, Harvard, MIT, Rockefeller University, and Columbia University have developed a system that captures detailed, multiple-view video of animals in their natural environment, and then uses data from those video images to build a detailed model of how the animal moves. This allows scientists to use movement and behavior as a window into brain function.

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Duke AI Health Proposal Studio on -Omics Projects | April 5

In this one-hour virtual learning experience, 3 teams of Duke investigators will discuss their proposal concepts with data science experts. For April 5, proposal concepts will include genomic analysis related to sickle cell anemia, lifestyle intervention adherence, and transplant optimization. The proposal studio vLE concept is newly launching in spring 2021, with the goal of assisting Duke investigators with proposal development in health data science, and in sharing experiences with the broader Duke community. The series is co-hosted by Duke AI Health and the Duke+Data Science (+DS) program.

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Now Accepting Proposals for Placement of a Pathology AI Health Fellow for Projects within the Department

AI Health is currently considering requests for placement of a Pathology AI Health Data Science Fellow. The AI Health Data Science Fellowship is a 2-year training program in data science with direct application for healthcare. The Pathology AI Health fellow will be funded jointly by AI Health and the Department of Pathology. Fellows will also receive support from AI Health and the Duke Department of Biostatistics and Bioinformatics, with overall program supervision provided by the Duke Clinical Research Institute’s Center for Predictive Medicine.

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