Northwestern develops respiratory infection diagnosis program

Northwestern University and Chicago-based health system Endeavor Health have developed a new computer program that can help doctors identify Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome. A debilitating, often fatal lung condition, ARDS is common in intensive care patients and is estimated to affect up to 190,000 Americans per year, according to the journal Nature Communications.

While common, the condition is difficult to diagnose because doctors have to piece together many types of disconnected information, such as lab results, chest X-rays, other doctors' notes and heart tests – finding clues of the condition that may go unnoticed. 

The new program sifts through that information automatically, and in testing, was highly accurate in identifying the condition.

WHAT'S THE IMPACT

ARDS causes fluid to build up in the lungs' alveoli, or air sacs, leading to dangerously low oxygen levels in the blood stream. It usually occurs after an injury or infection of the lungs, such as COVID-19, and has a mortality rate of more than 40%. 

ARDS is more common in critically ill and intensive care unit patients, the journal found.

"As an ICU doctor, you're busy taking care of patients, and it's hard to comb through all of the data required to make that diagnosis," said Dr. Curtis Weiss, an Endeavor Health pulmonologist and co-director of Critical Care Medicine, who co-authored the paper and is principal investigator on the grant that funded the work. "That's where AI and machine learning come in. We think this program could help fill that gap, creating an additional safeguard to help doctors and patients here in Chicagoland and well beyond."

To develop the program, Weiss partnered with Northwestern University engineering researchers Felix Morales and Luis Nunes Amaral, who specialize in data science and smart tools for healthcare. Their new algorithm, built on clinical guidelines used by ICU doctors, looks back at patient records to automatically identify those who had ARDS while they were on ventilators.

"If ARDS isn't caught right away, patients may not receive the life-saving treatment they need as quickly," said Morales, a research specialist in NU's department of Engineering Sciences and Applied Mathematics and lead author on the paper. "An automatic tool like this could catch more cases, helping doctors give the right treatment sooner."

The team tested their program on medical data from a hospital outside the Endeavor Health and Northwestern systems and found it correctly diagnosed 93.5% of true ARDS cases and only made mistakes (false alarms) about 17% of the time. This is an improvement compared with estimates of how often doctors recognize the condition in the ICU.

The algorithm will now be piloted at Endeavor Health, a health system formed by the merger of NorthShore University HealthSystem, Edward-Elmhurst Health, Swedish Hospital and Northwest Community Healthcare.

Amaral, a professor of engineering sciences and applied mathematics at NU, said the success of this program speaks to the promise of AI as a tool to help doctors make diagnoses.

"Even for conditions other than ARDS, this is a good example of AI's potential as a care tool and how it might lead to better and faster treatment," Amaral said. "AI done carefully can give doctors superpowers, helping them spot critical conditions faster, more accurately and at a scale no human could manage alone."

THE LARGER TREND

The use of artificial intelligence in healthcare is gaining popularity among physicians, found a February survey from the American Medical Association, though many remain guarded in their enthusiasm due to lingering concerns.

About 35% of physicians expressed more enthusiasm than concern – up from the 30% who felt the same last year. The portion of physicians whose concerns exceeded their enthusiasm for health AI decreased to 25% in 2024 from 29% in 2023, and about two in five physicians remain equally excited and concerned about health AI, with almost no change between 2023 and 2024.

In particular, physicians are increasingly intrigued by AI's power as a clinical assistant, and in its potential to reduce administrative burdens, enhance diagnostic accuracy and personalize treatments.

More than half of health system leaders and insurance executives are calling artificial intelligence an "immediate priority," and 73% of organizations said they were growing their financial commitments to the technology, according to a November Define Ventures survey.

Seventy-three percent of organizations have established governance structures, which can align AI incentives with organizational values.