Healthcare Artificial Intelligence Needs Patient Data: Who “Owns” the Data About You?

Adam M. Alessio, PhD 
Professor 
Department of Computational Mathematics, Science, and Engineering 
Department of Biomedical Engineering and Radiology 
Institute for Quantitative Health Science & Engineering 
Michigan State University 
Recorded March 24, 2021 

Artificial intelligence (AI) is increasingly used in modern medicine to improve diagnostics, therapy selection, and more. These computer algorithms are developed, trained, and tested with our patient medical data. Certainly beyond the healthcare space, many companies—from Facebook to Amazon to your local pub—are using our consumer data. This is data about you, but is it your data? What rights do you have versus the owners of the data? Does medical data used for the benefit of future patients deserve different treatment than consumer data? This lecture will explore examples of AI and an evolving view of data ownership and stewardship in medicine. 

This lecture was part of the 2020-2021 Bioethics Public Seminar Series, presented by the Center for Ethics.