Team Viz
Jun 28, 2024
Radiologists are under increasing pressure to work faster and review more images in less time. It is no wonder that employee burnout is a growing issue throughout the industry.
What today’s radiologist really needs is a tireless assistant working alongside them, analyzing images, spotting critical findings, and prioritizing those cases in the worklist for urgent review. That approach could help to ensure that potentially life-threatening results are identified faster, communicated to the referring clinicians quicker, and enable those patients to be diagnosed earlier. For stroke patients, “time is brain,” so shortening the time to diagnosis can directly impact their longevity and quality of life. Artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms can provide that level of sorely needed, unwavering support for overburdened radiologists.
But how do you choose the right vendor to meet your healthcare organization’s AI needs? There are several important factors to consider.
Provides a Tailored Solution
Make sure you select an AI product developed and validated for use in the radiology department. Reviewing complex imaging studies is a demanding role, which requires speed, accuracy, and purpose-built tools. The Viz Radiology™ Suite, for example, contains AI algorithms trained to identify suspected cases of stroke, cerebral aneurysm, subdural hemorrhage, pulmonary embolism, and other potentially fatal diseases and flag them for rapid review within the radiologist’s workflow.
Improves Care Coordination
Once the radiologist has confirmed the diagnosis, they need to be able to communicate that information to the referring clinician and care team together with the relevant computed tomography (CT), CT angiography or magnetic resonance imaging in real time using a HIPAA compliant platform.
Choosing an AI-powered solution that fits into the healthcare organization’s existing IT framework can not only help to improve the radiology workflow and expedite the patient’s diagnosis, but also facilitate coordination of their care across multiple departments.
Viz Radiology Suite integrates directly into the healthcare organization’s picture archiving and communication system (PACS), so the patient’s images are available for immediate review. Specialists on call can view the images through Viz.ai’s high fidelity, 3D web or mobile viewer. Viz Radiology also enables HIPAA-compliant communication across the multidisciplinary care team. In addition, the patient’s images are saved directly to their electronic health record.
Kevin Abrams, MD, FACR, Chief of Radiology, Medical Director of Neuroradiology and MRI at Baptist Hospital, describes his experience using the Viz Radiology Suite, “Viz.ai acts as my co-pilot, it is as if I have a second set of eyes overseeing the triage process, allowing Radiologists to be more confident in their findings, as well as prioritization for critical findings.”
Conducts Evidence-based Research
It’s important to pick a vendor with a strong focus on clinical research that insists on pressure-testing its AI algorithms in real-world medical settings to ensure that they provide high quality, consistent, reliable results. More than 100 clinical abstracts and papers have been published demonstrating positive patient and economic outcomes using the Viz.ai One™ platform on which the Viz Radiology Suite resides.
It’s also valuable to partner with a vendor that has extensive experience in the field and has worked successfully with regulatory agencies. Viz.ai One is already being used to speed the diagnosis and follow-up care for patients at more than 1,600 hospitals in the United States and most of the 50 largest healthcare systems. Furthermore, there are now 13 FDA-cleared algorithms and care pathways for neurovascular and cardiac conditions on the Viz.ai One platform.
Takes an Unbiased Approach
There is a concerted effort being made to improve diversity, equity and inclusion across all aspects of the healthcare industry. But the quality of any AI algorithm is only as good as the datasets on which it was trained.
Viz.ai goes to great lengths to ensure that its algorithms do not exhibit bias. The training data is composed of a diverse clinical presentation of the disease and diverse patient data from populations of different age, sex, ethnicity, and race. When training is complete, algorithms are tested with a different dataset to avoid performance bias with re-using data. Viz uses separate subsets of that data that are , one for product training, one for validation, and one for clinical performance.
Maintains High Security Standards
Patient privacy and data protection should be top priorities for any AI vendor in healthcare.
Viz.ai passed its Service Organization Control (SOC) 2 Type II + HIPAA audit in February for the fourth consecutive year. By consistently meeting that American Institute of Certified Public Accounts metric, which involves an extensive process conducted by a Big Four audit firm, Viz.ai reiterates its commitment to maintaining the highest standards of data security, compliance, and responsible AI.
“SOC 2 Type II compliance stands as the guardian of trust in both healthcare and AI realms, ensuring that sensitive data is handled with the utmost care and integrity,” explains Alex Vasserman, DNP, RN, CPHIMS, Corporate Director of Business Continuity and Informatics at Jackson Health System Miami.
Offers a Flexible Approach
As the use of AI continues to increase throughout the healthcare industry, organizations will need solutions that can scale as the number of desired applications grows and additional funds become available.
Viz.ai products are designed to integrate seamlessly into a healthcare organization’s existing IT framework and workflows, so they can be scaled up without causing significant disruptions or compatibility issues. The company also offers a customizable approach, featuring an a la carte menu, technology bundles, and an enterprise option that includes current and upcoming algorithms, which would likely require less paperwork and fewer approvals for larger healthcare organizations.
Conclusion
AI algorithms can help support busy staff, improve disease detection, and facilitate patient care. Selecting the right AI vendor requires due diligence, but following these steps will help to ensure you choose AI solutions that generate reliable and repeatable results. If you choose the Viz Radiology Suite, you will also see patient care coordination benefits.