Pediatric Radiology AI Resources

Learn more about what we’re doing to ensure safe and effective AI for pediatric care.

Artificial intelligence (AI) in medical imaging is rapidly growing to advance healthcare in adults but is less developed in the pediatric population. AI algorithms trained on adults often cannot be applied to children due to differences in body size, growth, disease types, disorder manifestations, imaging bioeffects and socioeconomic factors.

Pediatric needs are often overlooked in AI development, testing and deployment, making many applications ineffective or harmful for children. To address this, the ACR^® Informatics Commission's Pediatric AI Working Group has launched the Image IntelliGently™ campaign to promote safe, high-quality AI for pediatric care.

Image IntelliGently endorses the following statements to ensure pediatric patient access and safety in medical imaging AI:

AI used in pediatric patients should be designed for and shown to work in pediatric patients.
Healthcare systems that care for both adults and children should consider an AI algorithm’s impact on pediatric patients before the AI is used only in adults.
Regulatory changes are needed to ensure pediatric patient safety. Specifically, visible standard verbiage for all FDA-labeled medical devices to include the age of subjects for which the devices were tested, the age group in whom the devices are applicable and a warning when a device has not been cleared for pediatric use.
Collaboration between pediatric radiologists, data scientists, vendors and regulatory bodies is needed to promote the development of safe, clinically useful AI for pediatric patients.

Advocacy Efforts

Regulatory and legislative stakeholder engagement is key to ensuring the medical community continues to Image IntelliGently.

Get Involved

If you’re using AI in pediatric patients, we want to hear from you.

Contact us

How toTake Action

Educate and advocate for pediatric imaging AI.

Advocate for consistent inclusion of pediatric applicability labeling on FDA clearance documents.
Advocate for incentives to promote the development of pediatric AI. This may take the form of additional funding for research studies or resources within the FDA for clearance.
Support prioritization of pediatric radiology AI anytime you can influence development. It’s needed ASAP, just to catch up!
Ask vendors if their algorithms have been tested in children.
Ask vendors if their algorithms have been FDA-cleared for use in children.
Advocate for the consistent inclusion of pediatric applicability labeling on FDA clearance documents.

Address its impact on pediatric patients.

Do radiologists and technologists know that AI isn’t being used on pediatric patients? If not, communication is needed.
Check to see if the turnaround times for pediatric patients are being impacted when triage algorithms are used only in adults.
If you’re using AI to shorten MRI sequences, audit your data to ensure it works as well in pediatric patients as it does in adults.

Share your experience.

Which adult tools are you using in pediatric patients? How well do they work?
Does the AI work well across all pediatric ages or are there differences with subsets? For example, does the algorithm work well in teenagers, but not in infants?
Are there extra steps you are taking to make sure AI keeps working as well in pediatric patients as it does in your adult patients?

Resources

Understand the Impact of AI in Pediatric Radiology

Take a look at our video library to learn more about safe and effective AI for pediatric care.

Featured video: The Importance of AI in Pediatric Radiology

Ready to Take the Image IntelliGently Pledge?

We are formally endorsing the "Image IntelliGently" Campaign led by the American College of Radiology^® (ACR^®). We wholeheartedly support the campaign's mission to ensure that AI in radiology is safe, equitable and reliable for children.

We are aligned with the campaign's vision that:

All pediatric patients will have access to clinically useful AI in radiology.
The health of pediatric patients will be improved through the use of AI in radiology.

We recognize the importance of this initiative. As the medical community leans more heavily into the use of AI for various applications, it is imperative that these technologies are not only safe and reliable but also tailored for their specific audiences. It is widely understood that children are not merely small adults; they have unique medical and developmental needs. Thus, AI tools developed for adults may not be suitable or accurate for pediatric patients.

For organizations to further demonstrate their endorsement:

You will provide a link to the "Image IntelliGently" webpage on your official website.
You pledge to promote the safe, equitable and reliable use of AI for medical imaging in children.

In return, we understand that our organization's website will be listed as an endorsing body on the "Image IntelliGently" webpage. This mutual recognition stands as a testament to our shared commitment to advancing the best possible care for children worldwide.

We commend the ACR for spearheading this vital campaign and pledge our unwavering support.

Image IntelliGently is endorsed by:

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