Nick van Terheyden MD, Presenter: Employee, Nuance Communications, Inc

Narrative reporting remains the mainstay of radiology reporting and will continue to be the foundation of effective communication between radiologists and ordering clinicians. Watson DeepQA will empower and assist radiologists by providing accurate, real-time information that can be leveraged to help make life critical decisions. Real-time support analytics will usher a new paradigm for healthcare. It will help physicians make sense of the enormous amount of data emanating & provide evidence enabling evidence-based clinical decision-making

In February this year IBM successfully took on the 2 most successful contestants on the American Quiz Show “Jeopardy.”The result was a victory for IBM and has become renowned as the latest man versus machine project.Leading up to this triumph was 4 years of research and development focused on designing a computer system that could compete against the best humans at a task thought to require high levels of human intelligence.This process closely matches the challenge presented in healthcare of capturing relevant clinical data to be applied at the point of clinical care

This presentation will introduce attendees to Watson offering insight into the DeepQA process, the complexities and details of the DeepQA challenge and how these tools and techniques can be applied. Prototype tools will be presented for delivering advanced analytics in the radiologist’s workplace that offer rapid access to critical, specific and highly relevant data with corresponding links to underlying evidence

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is already being successfully applied as part of the imaging ordering process. Extending this concept to further apply additional contextually relevant data to help guide the clinical decision making process offers radiologists the potential of unlocking the vast medical data available which otherwise is not readily accessible in a timely fashion. In its raw form with no additional customization Watson’s DeepQA already offers a tremendous advance in AI. The project builds on the foundation Watson DeepQA architecture expanding the capabilities with healthcare and radiology specific extension

van Terheyden, N, Calling Dr. Watson to Radiology.  Radiological Society of North America 2011 Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting, November 26 - December 2, 2011 ,Chicago IL. http://archive.rsna.org/2011/11015530.html