Dr. Pablo Rengifo is an interventional cardiologist at Tallahassee Memorial HealthCare. He spoke recently with FLORIDA TREND about the expanding role artificial intelligence plays in diagnosing and treating cardiovascular diseases.

• Predicting Treatment: “Artificial intelligence is a real hot topic right now in medicine and cardiology. In the fields of orthopedic surgery and radiology, we know they are working on different types of A.I. software that can analyze X-rays and predict who is going to need treatment in five years.”
• Smarter A.I.: “The A.I. systems we use now are trainable. For example, when I dictate a note, even with my (Venezuelan) accent, you can instruct the computer to recognize ‘English with a South American Spanish’ accent. We just acquired a new A.I. system that can independently read studies from electrocardiograms, stress testing and catheterizations.”
• Improvements Needed: “I think at this stage, the use of A.I. in cardiology is still relatively novel. A.I. doesn’t ‘understand’ what a disease is. That’s the challenge at this point. A.I. is being used very effectively in many other industries. But I don’t think A.I.’s penetration into the medical community has advanced to the level of being able to actually diagnose cardiovascular diseases. Until artificial intelligence gets more advanced where it can perform a diagnosis, its role in cardiology will continue to be that of another helpful tool at our disposal.”