UK Edition
AI doctor app Babylon fails to diagnose heart attack, complaint alleges
An artificial intelligence app that claims to be able to diagnose medical conditions better than human doctors fails to properly identify heart attacks, it has been claimed.
Babylon, which lets people book virtual appointments with GPs and receive prescriptions through its app, also operates a tool that uses artificial intelligence to automatically diagnose health problems. Customers can type their symptoms and receive a diagnosis through the app.
The Financial Times reported that the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) had received a complaint about Babylon from an anonymous doctor. The complaint claimed that Babylon’s automatic symptoms checker didn’t properly diagnose a heart attack.
The MHRA said that Babylon is not under formal investigation, but also said that “patient safety is our highest priority and should anything be identified during our post-market surveillance we take action as appropriate to protect public health”.
Babylon claimed that the complaint to the MHRA came from an anonymous person who “has repeatedly tried to troll Babylon on Twitter.” A spokesman said that the anonymous complainant’s “behaviour is against General Medical Council’s code of conduct and would lead to punitive action.”
Another doctor, Hugo Farne, told said he had complained to the Advertising Standards Authority over the way that Babylon referenced its relationship with the MHRA and the Care Quality Commission on its website.
Last month, Babylon held an event in London where its chief executive Ali Parsa claimed that Babylon’s technology had scored 81pc in questions from the Royal College of GPs’ entrance exam, above the average pass mark for human doctors of 72pc.
Babylon’s claims lead to criticism from the Royal College of GPs and the British Medical Association (BMA). The Royal College of GPs said that Babylon risked “undermining and damaging traditional general practice services”, while the BMA said that Babylon’s study “represents an over-simplistic and crude measure of what it means to be a good doctor.”