"AI's Role in Identifying Patients' Risky Alcohol Consumption Pre-Surgery"

A new analysis suggests that artificial intelligence could help identify patients at risk of dangerous alcohol use before surgery by analyzing contextual clues in their medical records, such as diagnostic codes, notes, test results, and billing data. The study used a natural language processing model to assess the records of over 53,000 surgical patients and found that the AI model was able to identify three times as many at-risk patients compared to diagnostic codes alone. The findings highlight the potential for AI to assist clinicians in identifying patients who may need intervention or postoperative support, ultimately improving patient care and outcomes.