Dr. Bob Wachter: How AI Is Transforming Health Care

Artificial intelligence can now match and sometimes surpass physicians in areas such as diagnosis to empathy. What does that mean for doctors, patients, and the future of our health care? Join us for a look at AI in medicine from the physician who has more than a dozen times ranked as one of the 50 most influential physician-executives in the United States by Modern Healthcare magazine, Robert Wachter, M.D.

Wachter will sift out the facts from the hype and make a compelling argument for AI’s power to transform health care. He says that the system is currently buckling under the weight of bureaucratic pressures, soaring costs, and clinician burnout; in that environment, AI doesn’t have to be perfect, just better.

Wachter conducted extensive research and more than 100 interviews with leaders in medicine, technology, policy and business; he presented the results in his new book A Giant Leap: How AI is Transforming Healthcare and What That Means for Our Future. In it, he also considers challenges such as AI hallucinations, biases and misinformation. Yet AI is already in hospitals and clinics drafting notes, answering patient questions, recommending treatments, interpreting images, and guiding surgeries.

Will this collaboration of humans and technology be successful in the long term? Will it become the savior of health care or just another source of harm and frustration?

SPEAKERS

Dr. Robert Wachter, Professor and Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) and Author of “A Giant Leap: How AI Is Transforming Healthcare and What That Means for Our Future”

In Conversation with DJ Patil, Former U.S. Chief Data Scientist, General Partner, GreatPoint Ventures, Member, Commonwealth Club World Affairs of California Board of Governors

5:30 p.m. doors open & check-in
6–7 p.m. program
7 p.m. book signing
(all times Pacific Time)

Wachter photo by Susan Merrell; photo courtesy the speaker.