EPIC Urges HHS to Prioritize Patient Privacy in Clinical Care AI Uses

EPIC submitted comments this week to the Department of Health and Human Services responding to its request for information about “Accelerating the Adoption and Use of Artificial Intelligence as Part of Clinical Care.” EPIC urged HHS to prioritize privacy in the adoption and use of all technologies used in clinical settings because privacy leads to increased trust and improved health outcomes. EPIC explained that unregulated AI technologies can be used in harmful, opaque, and unaccountable ways and submitted an excerpt of EPIC’s recent health privacy report Beyond HIPAA to provide further information to HHS about these harms.

EPIC’s report recommends that any entity which collects health data from an individual be required to obtain the individual’s explicit consent before deidentifying their data for the purpose of developing an AI system; that entities reassess their deidentification procedures in light of reidentification risks, even with HIPAA-compliant data sets; and that insurers conduct independent testing and audits to ensure that automated decisions are made fairly based on medical expertise and a patient’s individual’s medical history.

EPIC routinely advocates to protect the medical and health privacy of all people.