Narrative Review and Evidence Mapping

From self-driving cars to smart supply chains, artificial intelligence (AI) has already changed many aspects of human life. Some areas of health care, such as medical imaging, are benefiting from AI, but questions remain on the role of AI in the broader health sector. Recognizing the importance of this emerging technology and the potential of AI to improve health for all, the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute commissioned this report, which focuses on applications of AI in health that are currently in use or may be in use in the near future.

The report contains 3 major components: a broad overview of all applications of AI in health care; a narrative review describing a specific subset of these applications; and finally a systematic description—or mapping—of the evidence surrounding these specific applications' use. The scope of the narrative review and evidence mapping portions of this report, which constitute the core of this study, includes applications that aim to improve care and outcomes for individual patients and that address a defined range of health conditions, while excluding medical imaging applications, as these have already been adopted and studied to a wider extent.