The 2018 World Medical Innovation Forum, held April 23 to 25, will bring together health care leaders from around the globe to highlight advancements and opportunities at the intersection of patient care and artificial intelligence. As in previous years, the WMIF – hosted by Partners HealthCare – will prominently feature speakers from BWH. This year’s forum will include a fireside chat between Brigham Health President Betsy Nabel, MD, and BWH surgeon Atul Gawande, MD, as well as a panel discussion led by Adam Landman, MD, Brigham Health chief information officer.

“This year’s World Medical Innovation Forum will bring together our researchers and clinicians with industry leaders to discuss how artificial intelligence and digital technologies can transform health care delivery, from drug development to patient care to hospital operations,” said Landman.

International experts will share their perspectives on how cognitive computation, machine learning and big data are transforming patient care. The Discovery Café lunch series will offer seven intensive workshops addressing cutting-edge artificial intelligence topics. The Forum will also hold a session called the “Disruptive Dozen” – highlighting 12 emerging technologies with the potential to revolutionize the field over the next decade.

During the First Look session, 19 early-career investigators from BWH and Massachusetts General Hospital will kick off the 2018 World Medical Innovation Forum with brief presentations highlighting their discoveries and insights in the field of artificial intelligence. Among those presenters will be Hadi Shafiee, PhD, director of the Laboratory of Micro/Nanomedicine and Digital Health at BWH, who will discuss his use of micro/nanotechnology and consumer electronics to meet clinical needs such as disease detection and treatment monitoring.

“AI is a powerful tool that I believe will have a significant and broad impact on our daily lives,” says Shafiee. “In my laboratory, we aim to develop low-cost, portable, smart medical devices for disease diagnosis and treatment monitoring. I am excited to hear more about the vision of the expert panelists on the potential challenges surrounding the commercialization of AI-based medicals devices and how these devices may evolve.”

Nathalie Agar, PhD, of the Department of Neurosurgery at BWH, will also present during the First Look session. Agar, whose work focuses on developing mass spectrometry imaging methods and applying them to study brain tumors, presented at the first annual World Medical Innovation Forum in 2015 and looks forward to returning this year. “I am particularly excited about this year’s forum as an opportunity to broadcast the importance and promise of AI in medicine to the community,” says Agar.

Academic researchers, app developers, clinicians, data scientists, industry leaders, investors and other innovators will be in attendance, and interested BWHers are encouraged to attend the Forum. For more information, including information on registration, visit worldmedicalinnovation.org.