May 9, 2022
The Fraunhofer Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI) has joined forces with the University of Oxford (UK) to establish the “Collaborations and Outreach” (WG-CO) working group. The group is part of the ITU/WHO focus group "AI for Health" (FG-AI4H) that develops global evaluation standards for AI in healthcare. The newly formed group emerged from previous work done by the “Global Health Strategy Group for Digital Health” initiative at Oxford University. FG-AI4H is led by Thomas Wiegand, professor at TU Berlin and executive director at Fraunhofer HHI.
WG-CO is one of seven working groups within FG-AI4H and is led by Andrew Farlow (Oxford) and Matthias Groeschel (Fraunhofer HHI). WG-CO has a special role within the focus group: While most working groups deal with topics relevant to quality assurance of AI (e.g. ethics, regulation, clinical evaluation), the members of WG-CO work on communicating the focus group’s work results to the public.
The working group intends to bring AI standards and software services developed by the focus group into application. WG-CO is building collaborations with industry partners, research institutions, NGOs, funders, and other stakeholders. Together, all parties work to combine digital health technologies with FG-AI4H standards and software. WG-CO hopes to not only create visibility for the work done within the Focus Group, but it also builds the collaborations within which they can be applied.
Furthermore, the team is working on communication tools to regularly report on the work of FG-AI4H. For example, Matthias Groeschel along with colleagues has started a series of webinars on "AI and Health" , under the umbrella of AI for Good, the UN’s leading initiative on how AI can help achieve the sustainable development goals. Since May 2021, he has invited thought leaders from the field of AI and medicine and has discussed the promises and perils of the increased use of data driven work in healthcare. The event series has already reached 7,000 interested parties. In addition, WG-CO continues an initiative by the University of Oxford by organizing symposia with leading experts to explore various topics in the field of digital medical technologies. The symposia are open to the public. Afterwards, the group compiles meeting reports and makes them available on the working group's website .
The next FG-AI4H meeting is scheduled for May 31 to June 2, 2022. It will kick off with a workshop on May 30, 2022. Both events will take place in hybrid format and will be held at Fraunhofer HHI in Berlin. Virtual participation is also possible.
Further information on events and activities can be found on the FG-AI4H website .