Dr. Bensoussan serves as Contact Principal Investigator of the Precision Public Health Grand Challenge, an initiative within the Bridge2AI program. Her team integrates AI and clinical data to detect voice biomarkers that may indicate conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, depression, Parkinson’s disease, and cancer.

“That’s what we’re really trying to recreate with artificial intelligence—taking that expertise from every specialist where we can hear things because we know the disease, and really convert ‘you don’t sound right’ to why exactly you don’t sound right,” said Dr. Bensoussan.

Her team’s work highlights both the potential and responsibility of using AI in clinical care. “We have to be careful with trusting the technology fully, and that really comes with all the ethical questions when using technology,” she said. “If you’re a doctor, and you’re adopting a technology, you want to be sure that it’s accurate. And for it to be accurate, it has to be trained on a lot of different people.”

As telehealth and digital clinical tools become more widespread, voice-based diagnostics may offer a way to identify illness sooner and expand access to care. “Is AI going to replace a laryngologist in an academic center? Probably not,” Bensoussan said. “But there are only about a couple hundred of us in the country, and people often wait six or eight months to be seen. If we can get these technologies to people earlier so they know which specialist to find, that’s really important.”

The full Chasing Life interview offers an inside look at how AI is helping researchers “listen” for signs of disease—potentially transforming how clinicians detect and manage conditions in the future.

Listen to the episode: http://swap.fm/l/clyt090425

Watch the segment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kVlM6HBnYw