When a patient undergoes a routine knee surgery, they are under the direct care of numerous health providers, such as an anesthesiologist, a physician assistant and a surgeon. But when you peel back the layers of what it takes to coordinate a safe and successful operation, there are thousands of caregivers linked by millions of interactions — all of whom must collaborate seamlessly to ensure optimal patient outcomes.

At the UF College of Medicine, physician-scientists are leveraging artificial intelligence to model this expansive clinician-clinician network, creating a robust patient safety graph capturing the almost infinite interactions between caregivers to change how we think about hospital operations and pioneer new ways of delivering quality care.

The patient safety graph is one of the many ways the College of Medicine is turning to AI to improve patient safety under the AI-QI initiative, a series of programs designed to make a tangible impact in the realm of patient care by extending AI research into quality improvement activities at UF Health.

The U.S. government has recruited a team of University of Florida researchers and their private-industry collaborators for a crucial mission: to develop a new antibiotic to counter deadly pathogens. 

Each member of the UF team brings unique skills to the effort. Henry S. Heine, Ph.D., is an associate professor and research microbiologist specializing in advanced antibiotic therapies for biodefense purposes. Bret K. Purcell, M.D., Ph.D., a research associate professor, has expertise in applied therapeutics for emerging pathogens. Arnold Louie, M.D., a professor and researcher, has expertise in advanced antibiotic therapies for conventional and emerging bacterial pathogens. George L. Drusano, M.D., a professor and the director of UF’s Institute for Therapeutic Innovation, uses complex mathematical models to optimize drug treatment and reduce drug-development risks and poor therapeutic outcomes.

The drug being developed will be used to fight gram-negative bacteria such as plague, tularemia and another disease caused by Burkholderia pseudomallei.

Researchers at UF have developed a promising new CRISPR-powered method for noninvasive blood tests that could help clinicians diagnose cancer at earlier stages.

The team demonstrated that their strategy is as effective as the widely used reverse transcription quantitative polymerase chain reaction, or RT-qPCR, assays for cancer diagnosis and could be paired with a simple portable device for point-of-care clinical testing. The method works by detecting microRNAs, which are small RNA molecules involved in regulating gene expression, in tiny particles circulating in the blood called extracellular vesicles.

The researchers have filed a patent application based on the work to help make the one-pot CRISPR assay and the point-of-care technology broadly available for basic research and clinical use.