AQAD organizes a Seminar on Artificial Intelligence for Faculty of the College of Health Sciences
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The AQAD has organized a seminar for faculty in the College of Health Sciences. The seminar which was organized virtually was titled "Mainstreaming Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Teaching and Research: Challenges and Opportunities in the Health Sciences".
In his welcome address, the Director of AQAD, Prof. Daniel K. Twerefou emphasized the importance of using AI responsibly and ethically and the enormous support that AI can provide in teaching and research
The Presenter for the seminar, Prof. Bernard Shibwabu, Strathmore University, Kenya made the presentation which focused on several significant areas including Advancements in Deep Learning, Voice Contextualization Models, AI Automation in the Healthcare Industry and its Alignment with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), among others. He elaborated on the immense potential of AI in teaching and research as well as the challenges in integrating AI into teaching and research which involve inadequate storage devices for high-quality images, limited technology and internet access, insufficient energy supply in certain areas, concerns related to data security and ethical issues.
Professor Shibwabu emphasized the importance of ensuring a balanced and adequate distribution of resources, establishing reserve capacity to secure data, and integrating systems to facilitate the effective utilization of AI as some of the measures to address the challenges associated with the use of AI.
A cross-section of participants
In his contribution, the Discussant, Dr. Kofi Sarpong Adu-Manu, a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Computer Science, University of Ghana highlighted the essential role of data in powering AI-driven healthcare systems and addressed the significant challenges faced by African nations in generating and utilizing this crucial data. He referenced Ghana's ongoing endeavour to implement electronic healthcare systems, acknowledging the limitations imposed by capacity issues, incomplete system adoption, and presented Kenya's success in connecting pharmacies to medical centres as a commendable example for emulation. Emphasizing the need for seamless data connectivity across different healthcare delivery levels, Dr. Adu-Manu envisioned a future where data duplication is minimized and patients' access to their medical information is significantly improved for AI-powered tools that would give them complete control over their medical records.