2023 Omenn Lecture

Senior Advisor, National Academy of Medicine

November 1, 2023

3:00pm lecture, 4:00pm reception
Cannon Room, Building C, Harvard Medical School
240 Longwood Ave, Boston, MA 02115
[ Photo Gallery ]

Abstract

Laura Adams will summarize the guiding principles of the upcoming symposium on Responsible AI for Social and Ethical Healthcare (RAISE).

The transformative power of Artificial Intelligence is at once inspiring optimism and opposition, possibilities, and pause. As AI rapidly comes of age in healthcare, this session explores the hope, hype, promise, and peril of today’s AI, and the opportunities to shape its impact. The session will describe the enormous benefits and potential for harm, as well as the ethical and equity considerations surrounding AI and applications. It is imperative to be thoughtful about putting appropriate guardrails in place that promote innovation while mitigating harm and doing so before the window of opportunity closes. Governance of AI at all levels will be critical to assuring the safe, ethical, and responsible use of AI to positively impact the future of person-centered care and the lives of all those working to advance it.

Bio

Laura Adams, Senior Advisor at the National Academy of Medicine (NAM) provides strategic advising for the Science and Technology portfolio of the Leadership Consortium and leads the NAM’s Artificial Intelligence Code of Conduct (AICC) national initiative. Her expertise is digital health, the science of improvement, and human-centered care. Laura serves on the Steering Committee of the Coalition for Health AI (CHAI); the Oversight Council for the Massachusetts Center for Health Information and Analysis; and boards of T2 Biosystems and TMA Precision Health. She is a strategic advisor for Inflammatix, a Burlingame, CA-based biotech company specializing in transcriptomics/host immune response diagnostics.

Laura chaired the Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) Planning Committee for the Digital Infrastructure for Population Health and a Learning Healthcare System initiative. She was among the first to bring the principles of healthcare quality improvement to the Middle East, in conjunction with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, and the Harvard Institute for Social and Economic Policy in the Middle East. Laura is recognized as a strategic leader of large scale multisectoral initiatives with a deep experience in and an understanding of the complex U.S. health care sector, including how the components function and interact. Health Data Management named her one of their Most Powerful Women in Health IT in the Thought Leader category. She has delivered conference keynotes and invited lectures in nearly every state in the union and in 13 foreign countries.