The company behind a smartphone app for healthcare professionals has announced plans for a powerful new machine-learning feature after months of collaboration with Waterloo Engineering professor Alexander Wong.
Joshua Landy, co-founder of Figure 1, told the recent International Congress on Electrocardiology that it will provide free, high-quality electrocardiogram (ECG) analysis on its popular social network for doctors.
“The ECG is the least expensive, highest-impact diagnostic tool we have in medicine today – and we can now make it even better,” said Landy, a critical care doctor. “This project will bring instantaneous interpretations of electrocardiograms to everyone with access to a smartphone.”
Wong is a systems design engineering professor, Canada Research Chair in medical imaging systems and founding member of the Waterloo Artificial Intelligence Institute (Waterloo.ai). His lab specializes in the application of artificial intelligence (AI) to medical imaging.
“It has been a tremendous pleasure working with a leader in digital healthcare like Figure 1 and we truly believe that this project will be a game-changer for healthcare professionals,” Wong said in a release issued by the Toronto-based company.
Figure 1 offers a knowledge-sharing platform for smartphones that is now in use by millions of healthcare professionals.
Its new feature – described by the company as a “project that is poised to revolutionize the diagnostic process” - will instantly convert photographs of ECG readouts into digital files. That format will enable sharing on a secure global network and interpretation by specialized AI algorithms.