Mock Interview Flashcards
So, what do you do?
What: Our team is developing an AI tool that patients can use to help make safe and effective decisions about their own health.
Why: As you know, patients with genital skin issues can be embarrassed, worry they have an STI, and delay or not seek care.
How: The tool we’re building allows a person with a genital skin issue to take a photo in the privacy of their home, enter related information like age, gender, duration of the lesion, and other symptoms, and the tool would provide a suggested visual-match to their most similar conditions
So you have a tool for patients? Or dermatologists?
Our tool is for patients. Patients use our tool quickly and privately at home. The tool will point them toward the appropriate medical care.
The photos that I get texted to me from old colleagues, most of them aren’t readable, and that person needs to be seen by a dermatologist anyway. How do you deal with that?
Yes! We are aware that this is a challenge. Fortunately smartphone use for skin image capture is a known science. We use image capture instructions that have been extensively tested and evaluated and produce readable images 99% of the time.
We realize that images of the genital area provide unique challenges and we’re working with STD and vulvar experts to ensure our instructions produce readable results. Would you like to see our current instructions? We’d love any tips on how we can improve!
So you have doctors look at images and evaluate them? Or the AI?
Our tool uses AI to evaluate the photo. It produces and the top 5 visual-match results and then provides ways for the user to connect to a physician to get appropriate care.
Are you working with any dermatologists?
Yes! Dr. Joe Kvedar a practicing dermatologist at MGH with over 20 years of experiencing is on our clinical advisory board. He is also the VP of connected health at Partners here in Boston. We’re also working with Dr. Jeffrey Klausner, an STD experpter at UCLA and Dr. Robert Swerlick a dermatologist at Emory.
How does the AI work?
Our computer is first trained on regular images like cats, birds, and squirrels and learns how to recognize different things. Then, we train it specifically on skin diseases, showing it thousands of examples of each disease. The computer learns like a resident learns, by looking at many images and cases, and determining the small difference between the visual presentation and symptoms history in order to build a differential diagnosis.
How good is it?
Currently our accuracy of is between the accuracy of a general practitioner and the accuracy of an expert dermatologist.
Our tool is 80% top 5 accurate, which means in 4 of 5 cases we identify the right disease in the top 5 visual matches.
We’re working to improve this through gathering more data. Any suggestions for diagnosed image resources?
What if the results are wrong on the AI? Is the AI liable for that outcome? Like what if it’s cancer and the patient/doctor doesn’t leaves it?
We have clear labeling about how our tool is not intended for primary diagnosis, but is a visual search tool to enable patients to make more informed choices. We’re not trying to replace the doctor evaluation experience, but rather point patients in the right direction, so they see it’s easy to get the care that they need.
Why are you doing this company?
We’re interested in dermatology because our founder, Susan, has had melanoma three times. We understand some of the barriers that can impact patients getting the right care at the right time and that’s what we want to improve.
So you’re charging doctor to use the tool?
No, our platform is free for users with skin issues.
What you’re doing sounds a lot like what Art is doing at VisualDx, and they already have thousands of images. How is what you’re doing different?
Yes, very familiar. We’ve spoken with Art before and appreciate what he has been building.
VisualDx it’s basically a textbook and visual atlas in your phone where you can do text-based searching by symptoms and description.
We are focused on a visual search based on the image, which replicates how a dermatologist evaluates a skin issue in the office.
Why did you start with genital conditions? It’s such a hard area of the body to assess. There are only so many presentations on such a small patch of skin. Even experts struggle to identify what’s going on.
Genital conditions are often considered taboo and patients are more likely to delay care or do their own search online. Our goal is to help people understand what’s going on with their skin and connect to doctors who can help.
When I originally go these images, my patients signed a consent form for teaching purposes. You’re a commercial entity, and my patients are shy to even let me use these images for teaching. I don’t think I can share them with you.
Totally, and we understand that patient privacy is your top priority and it’s ours too. We are only interested in collecting de-identified information in order to create the most accurate tool. This images are not viewed by the users.
What do I get out of this?
We can digitize your slide collection for you. You can have access to the digital collection that can be used to teach future generations of physicians and preserve all this information that would otherwise be lost to time.
I’m worried someone will be able to identify my patient, and that patient will sue me, and my institution will be responsible for millions of dollars in liability for a data breach.
The company we work with ensures that all identifiable information, from eyes to unique birthmarks or tattoos is covered in the photo to protect every patients privacy, similar to the way that photos are published in dermatology textbooks.
