Abstract

Major medical institutions collect large amounts of data about their patients, and artificial intelligence (AI) has allowed for new insights to be generated from these vast data sources. Although AI can provide life-saving potential to patients, little is known about the ways that this data is used. We reviewed the cyber and information policies and blogs of 25 major healthcare institutions in the United States and noted policies and practices relating to AI/algorithms and big data and data privacy, security, ethics, and bias. While all institutions studied had policy documents, only three of those documents mention AI, four mention bias, only one mentioned privacy, and none mentioned ethics. We found that few institutions mention these terms in their policies, therefore blogs were the primary source of information about how healthcare institutions use data. We also found that there was, in fact, little alignment between institution policies and the way that data is discussed in their blogs. This work contributes to an understanding of what policies exist and how major medical institutions are talking with the public about the introduction of AI and big data analytics into their capabilities and services.