New project „PEAK“: Kick-off in October 2021

Over a period of three years, the PEAK project (Perspektiven des Einsatzes und Akzeptanz Künstlicher Intelligenz in der Versorgung / engl: Perspectives on the Use and Acceptance of Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare) is researching the views of physicians, patients and the general population on AI – irrespective of disease patterns. It is funded by the Innovation Fund of the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA) with approximately 811,000 euros.

„There are a number of projects dealing with AI, but they are often focused on a disease pattern and a specific objective. However, we want to use different methods to research the general acceptance of AI in healthcare and also include ethical aspects. After all, it is also about the question of how far AI may go. The insights gained will flow into the care situation in everyday life,“ explains project initiator Prof. Dr. Rafael Mikolajczyk from the Institute of Medical Epidemiology, Biometry and Informatics at the University Medical Center Halle, who will create a corresponding questionnaire and carry out the biometric evaluation.

About 500 physicians and about 1,800 patients and members of the general population will be surveyed in a larger sample. The project also involves the cooperation partners of the SMITH and MIRACUM consortia, to which the University Medical Center Halle and the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg belong, as well as the Halle-Leipzig Research Practice Network and the Halle Institutes of General Medicine and of History and Ethics of Medicine.

AI can help in diagnosing and narrowing down diseases, for example supporting skin cancer screening, or in pre-selecting areas that should be looked at more closely using imaging. However, which types of AI are already being used in which application area of medical care in Germany has not yet been systematically recorded. This, too, is to be worked out as part of the „PEAK“ project.