ITE2010 – ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

DIGITAL
ASSIGNMENT-II
G2+TG2

Prof. Geraldine Bessie Amali D

How Artificial Intelligence is Helping to

Fight COVID-19?

Shubham Raj Singh | 17BIT0379

Shashank Gupta | 17BIT0386
Introduction
As the world grapples with COVID-19, every ounce of technological innovation
and ingenuity harnessed to fight this pandemic brings us one step closer to
overcoming it. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning are playing a
key role in better understanding and addressing the COVID-19 crisis. Machine
learning technology enables computers to mimic human intelligence and ingest
large volumes of data to quickly identify patterns and insights.

In the fight against COVID-19, organizations have been quick to apply their
machine learning expertise in several areas: scaling customer communications,
understanding how COVID-19 spreads, and speeding up research and treatment.
Artificial Intelligence Enables Rapid COVID-19 Lung
Imaging Analysis at UC San Diego Health
For most patients who have died of COVID-19, the pandemic disease caused by a novel
coronavirus, the ultimate cause of death was pneumonia, a condition in which inflammation
and fluid build-up make it difficult to breathe. Severe pneumonia often requires lengthy
hospital stays in intensive care units and assistance breathing with ventilators — medical
devices now in high demand in some cities grappling with a surge of COVID-19 cases.

To quickly detect pneumonia — and therefore better distinguish between COVID-19 patients
likely to need more supportive care in the hospital and those who could be followed closely at
home — UC San Diego Health radiologists and other physicians are now using artificial
intelligence (AI) to augment lung imaging analysis in a clinical research study enabled by
Amazon Web Services (AWS).

The new AI capability has so far provided UC San Diego Health physicians with unique
insights into more than 2,000 images. In one case, a patient in the Emergency
Department who did not have any symptoms of COVID-19 underwent a chest X-ray for
other reasons. Yet the AI readout of the X-ray indicated signs of early pneumonia,
which was later confirmed by a radiologist. As a result, the patient was tested for
COVID-19 and found to be positive for the illness.

Chest X-rays from a patient with COVID-19 pneumonia, original x-ray (left) and AI-for-pneumonia result (right). Patient has a
pacemaker device and an enlarged heart, which indicates that the AI algorithm is powerful enough to work even when the patient
has underlying health issues.
Two Israeli hospitals launch AI-based tele-ICU to
support COVID-19 patients

Predictive analytics platform CLEW is working with two Israeli hospitals to manage and treat
patients infected with the COVID-19 virus, while protecting frontline care workers.

Its TeleICU solution CLEW-ICU is being deployed at Sheba Medical Center and the Ichilov
Hospital at Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center.

The platform uses artificial intelligence (AI) based predictive analytics to exponentially
expand ICU capacity and resources. Its algorithms are trained to identify respiratory
deterioration in advance, enabling early interventions that might change the clinical
outcome, especially in COVID-19 patients. This allows healthcare workers to identify
disease severity from a remote command center.
Why It Matters 

CLEW says its machine learning models enable ICU workers to proactively manage disease
severity and workload. The telemedicine-based system is used remotely, so can be scaled to
cope with patient volume surges, while reducing a caregiver’s exposure risk to infected
patients.

The Larger Context 

Sheba Medical Center has been turning to telehealth to treat incoming COVID-19 patients,
with solutions such as Datos's remote patient monitoring platform, Tyto Care's connected
devices, a robot from InTouch Health, and XRHealth’s virtual reality telehealth services to
treat and monitor patients.

Israeli blood testing startup Sight Diagnostics also recently announced that it is working with
the medical centre to safely process blood samples of COVID-19 patients being monitored
and treated in a field hospital.
OSF HealthCare using AI virtual assistant to improve
COVID-19 screenings, care navigation
AI-driven solution helps health systems screen for and manage spread of COVID-19

With thousands of confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the U.S., hospitals and health systems are
working tirelessly to care for patients and limit the spread of the disease. GYANT’s COVID-19
Emergency Response Assistant screens for COVID-19 symptoms and risk factors, as well as directs
patients to the appropriate resources and care settings. The solution also provides general information
on symptoms and answers common questions about COVID-19, providing relief for overburdened
call center and front desk resources.

Usage rates of the virtual assistant, Clare, have significantly increased since adding
GYANT’s COVID-19 solution. Clare had 14,000 interactions about COVID-19 in the first
two days since her coronavirus update.

In addition, 85 percent of patients using Clare report a positive experience.

The COVID-19 Emergency Response Assistant will continuously update based on guidelines
from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization.

About GYANT
GYANT, the patient connection and relationship management company, drives more meaningful
patient-doctor engagements while improving care utilization and pathways. Leveraging its
customizable, artificial intelligence-enabled platform, which integrates into any EHR system,
GYANT creates easy to navigate and enjoyable experiences for patients that equate to cost and time
savings, and improved patient conversion rates for health systems. GYANT’s unique combination of
deep intelligence, physician oversight and a human-driven, empathetic approach allows health
systems to solve for traditional complex care issues, ensuring that patients receive the right care –
anytime and anywhere, increasing engagement, trust and loyalty along their entire healthcare journey.
Israeli defence ministry launches COVID-19
voice-test study using AI
An analysis of coronavirus patients’ voices could yield a “vocal fingerprint” to help detect COVID-19
symptoms in others and prioritize testing and treatment, the Israeli Defence Ministry said on Tuesday.

Starting this week, an Israeli start-up company working with hospitals and academic institutions will
sample voices of confirmed coronavirus patients through a mobile application in a research project led
by the ministry.

“These voice samples will be analysed using an AI (Artificial Intelligence)-based algorithm in

order to identify the unique vocal ‘fingerprint’, the ministry said in a statement.

The coronavirus affects the respiratory system and signs of distress can be reflected in the patterns of
a person’s voice and breathing.

Tal Wenderow, President and CEO of Vocalis Health, the company that developed the mobile app,
said that the algorithm would be used for remote diagnosis and monitoring.

At this stage, the app would only be used by medical staff together with the patients taking part in the
study, but the company’s website allows for anyone to take part and send a voice sample to the
researchers.

Researchers hope that healthcare systems would be able to use the data to prioritize testing and
hospitalization, allowing patients with light symptoms to stay at home.

The ministry said the monitoring system “can be conducted from afar, in order to prevent the spread
of the disease and overburdening of the national healthcare system.”

Initial results of the study were expected within six weeks.

Israel has reported more than 1,600 coronavirus cases and three fatalities.
Cordio and Rambam Hospital will trial AI that detects
coronavirus cases from speech samples

Cordio Medical today announced that it will begin a clinical trial at Haifa’s Rambam Hospital
on an app-based AI system that analyzes speech to diagnose and remotely monitor COVID-
19 patients. Assuming it passes scientific muster, the tech could be used to help treat self-
quarantined patients who are likely to have COVID-19 but haven’t yet been hospitalized.

Cordio’s COVID-19 solution is built on its existing HearO product, which was developed to
remotely monitor patients suffering from heart failure by collecting recordings via mobile
devices. Engineers at Cordio adapted it to identify the bilateral pneumonia with edema in the
lungs that is characteristic of COVID-19. And the company claims it can detect changes in
lung fluids and the onset of inflammation even before patients do.

Cordio says HearO is a “patient-dependent” system, in that the company builds a recording
baseline for COVID-19 patients when they’re in stable condition and later measures changes
from the baseline using AI algorithms — while anonymizing and privatizing the data. It
hopes to eventually detect COVID-19 deterioration within 10-48 hours.

AI-powered voice diagnostics

Given the triaging that voice diagnostic technologies might be able to perform for health care
institutions, the previously niche field is gaining attention.
Researchers from Carnegie Mellon and startup Voca.ai released an app they claim can
determine whether someone has COVID-19 from a voice recording, and Vocalis Health says
it’s working with Israel’s Health Ministry and Directorate for Defense Research and
Development to collect “vocal biomarkers” from COVID-19 patients and healthy people to
develop a screening technology.
Singapore’s social distancing policies pre-empted by
AI-powered insights

One week prior to the Singaporean government’s introduction of a slew of stay-at-home

measures, SparkBeyond’s platform had already predicted which points-of-interest
require distancing. 

The actionable insights outlined which schools and community clubs to close; if banning
religious gatherings is necessary; and determine when to ramp up sanitizing efforts in
MRT stations. As the insights adapt to changing dynamics, this further increases the
efficiency in resource deployment.

Table 1: This table shows insights generated by SparkBeyond using limited public data
until March 17, 2020.

The insights on the top table (above) and policies on the bottom are color-coded so that
they match accordingly. This shows how SparkBeyond can support policy-makers to
formulate policies. On closer examination, some of the insights may have a large radii,
for example the ones related to cinema and educational institutions, and it may seem too
drastic to shut these places down. However, one can argue that if these places are not
closed down, there will be a lot of surrounding footfall (students going to shopping
malls, coffee shops, nearby bus stops). Thus, shutting them down makes sense. When we
enforce blanket lockdowns, it safeguards places of interests and the surrounding areas.  

In generating a dynamic heatmap of Singapore, SparkBeyond augmented local data with

a wealth of external sources. This allowed us to forecast the correlation between
community activities, social clubs, and religious gatherings, and the number of infected
patients. The map below highlights infection clusters of communal and religious
gatherings.

Based on the heatmap above, Singaporean authorities can deploy resources more
efficiently to places with greater need. Note that all the outputs on this and the previous
slides are based on analysis using limited public data. Moving forward, SparkBeyond is
able to generate much deeper actionable insights if more granular and accurate data from
the government is provided.
References
 https://www.forbes.com/sites/gilpress/2020/04/17/ai-gets-into-the-fight-with-covid-
19/#7394920920c0
 https://www.beckershospitalreview.com/artificial-intelligence/uc-san-diego-uses-ai-
to-help-detect-pneumonia-covid-19-from-lung-x-rays.html
 https://venturebeat.com/2020/04/01/cordio-and-rambam-hospital-will-trial-ai-that-
detects-coronavirus-cases-from-speech-samples/
 https://www.healthitoutcomes.com/doc/gyant-introduces-covid-19-emergency-
response-assistant-in-use-by-healthcare-0001
 https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-israel-study/israeli-defense-
ministry-launches-covid-19-voice-test-study-idUSKBN21B2YV?mod=djemAIPro
 https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200317005136/en/