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Foundation Models in Healthcare: Opportunities, Biases and Regulatory Prospects in Europe

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Electronic Government and the Information Systems Perspective (EGOVIS 2022)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 13429))

Abstract

This article concerns the rise of a new paradigm in AI - “foundation models,” which are pre-trained on broad data at scale and subsequently adapted to particular downstream tasks. In particular, it explores the issue from the perspective of healthcare and biomedicine, focusing on the benefits of foundation models, as well as their propensity to encode bias, which threatens to exacerbate discriminatory practices already experienced by patients in Europe. Section 1 offers a brief introduction concerning the use of AI in healthcare and biomedicine and the problem of divergencies in access to and quality of healthcare across Europe. Section 2 familiarises the reader with the technical qualities of foundation models and recent developments in the field. Section 3 explains how the new health data strategy proposed by the EU could foster the development of foundation models in healthcare. Section 4 elaborates on their benefits in healthcare and biomedicine, while Sect. 5 explores the risk of bias exhibited by foundation models. Section 6 comments on the uncertain status of foundation models under the proposed Artificial Intelligence Act and offers brief recommendations concerning future regulation. Section 7 concludes.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Science and Technology, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy

    Malwina Anna Wójcik

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  1. Malwina Anna Wójcik
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Correspondence to Malwina Anna Wójcik .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Corvinus University of Budapest, Budapest, Hungary

    Andrea Kő

  2. National Research Council, Florence, Italy

    Enrico Francesconi

  3. Johannes Kepler Univversität Linz, Linz, Oberösterreich, Austria

    Gabriele Kotsis

  4. Vienna University of Technology, Vienna, Austria

    A Min Tjoa

  5. Johannes Kepler University of Linz, Linz, Austria

    Ismail Khalil

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Wójcik, M.A. (2022). Foundation Models in Healthcare: Opportunities, Biases and Regulatory Prospects in Europe. In: Kő, A., Francesconi, E., Kotsis, G., Tjoa, A.M., Khalil, I. (eds) Electronic Government and the Information Systems Perspective. EGOVIS 2022. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 13429. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12673-4_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12673-4_3

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