Over the next ten years, Forus Health, AuroLab and Perceptra will aim to deliver a combined six million AI-supported screenings in India and Thailand. Credit: IB Photography via Shutterstock.

Google Health has licenced its diabetic retinopathy artificial intelligence (AI) model to three partners to support six million AI-assisted screenings in underserved communities across India and Thailand. 

The new partnerships involve Forus Health, AuroLab and Perceptra, who will work on securing local regulatory approvals to integrate the AI model into clinical care systems in these regions. The screenings will be provided at no cost to patients. 

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Additionally, Google has linked up with the Thai Ministry of Public Health’s Department of Medical Services (DMS), for research on the implementation and cost-effectiveness of implementing its system. This initiative will incorporate Google’s AI model into Thailand’s National Innovation programme, facilitating a collaboration between Perceptra and DMS to deploy the technology in public sector hospitals. 

The AI-based tool – dubbed Automated Retinal Disease Assessment (ARDA) – helps healthcare professionals detect diabetic retinopathy, an eye condition where high blood sugar levels damage the blood vessels in the retina, causing vision loss if untreated. The tool may later be used to identify other retinal diseases, as per Google Health’s website. 

Previously, ARDA was developed through a collaboration with ophthalmologists and trained using over 100,000 retinal scans. In research published in JAMA, the tool accurately interpreted retinal scans to detect diabetic retinopathy. 

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Dr. Paisan Ruamviboonsuk, Retinal Specialist and Clinical Professor of Ophthalmology at the Rajavithi Hospital in Thailand said: “It seems to be just yesterday when Rajavithi Hospital and Google started collaborating on research for bringing AI to Thailand’s national diabetic retinopathy screening programmes. Seven years later, we’re grateful to bring this technology to Thai patients with diabetes but also Thailand’s public health system as a whole.” 

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Beyond ARDA, Google has several AI-driven healthcare initiatives and platforms. It is currently working on various AI applications for medical imaging, such as in lung cancer, dermatology, and other diseases through radiology. Google’s subsidiary DeepMind has developed AI tools like AlphaFold, which predicts protein structures, aiding drug discovery and medical research.   

AI continues to be a major buzzword in medtech and pharma, but its rapid rise in scientific research was reinforced earlier this month with the Nobel Prize in Chemistry awarded to three scientists for their work using AI – including two DeepMind scientists who helped to create AlphaFold2.  

According to a report on GlobalData’s Medical Intelligence Center, the AI market was worth $103bn in 2023. By 2030, it will have grown at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 39% to over $1tn.