Q&A with AIP Labs: Transforming Healthcare Delivery with AI

By Henry Duah

Founded in 2020 by visionary entrepreneur Latif Abid and other experts on his team, AIP Labs represents a paradigm shift in conceptualising and executing healthcare delivery. Specialising in healthtech within the Digital Health subsector, AIP Labs leverages cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) to revolutionise how medical services are accessed and provided. AIP Labs addresses a critical challenge plaguing healthcare systems worldwide: the scarcity of specialised healthcare professionals, such as dermatologists, amid escalating demand for personalised and accessible medical care. 

At the heart of AIP Labs’ solution is a comprehensive, end-to-end platform that streamlines clinical workflows, enhances diagnostic accuracy, and improves the overall patient experience. AIP Labs has developed an innovative Digital Dermatology Hospital platform powered by AI to streamline clinical processes, improve diagnostic accuracy, and elevate the overall patient experience by leveraging proprietary AI technologies.

The platform’s success has been demonstrated through large-scale deployments in countries like Hungary and Slovakia, where it has won praise from patients and clinicians for its intuitive user experience and ability to provide personalised, high-quality care. AIP Labs isn’t stopping there. The company has ambitious plans to expand its reach globally and deploy its transformative technology in 13 countries by 2028.

In the following Q&A, the founder of AIP Labs unveils the insights, strategies, and vision propelling this medical revolution forward.

The FutureList: How does the design of your innovation (AI Engine and AI Platforms) enhance its functionality and user experience? Are there specific design principles that have guided the development of your product?

Latif: AIP has spent significant time designing and refining its platform to ensure it is optimised from a user interface and user experience standpoint. It has done so by spending substantial time and effort working with renowned designers and product experts, but also through significant feedback incorporation across multiple large-scale deployments across the globe. That user feedback across various geographies, user types (patients vs clinicians), as well as the full spectrum of sociodemographics (age, gender, occupations, sophistication levels, remote vs urban), allowed us to incorporate a full spectrum of feedback and input to ensure the platform is fully optimised for every possible user. Ultimately, elegance and intuitive ease of use were among the primary drivers of our interface and experience.

The FutureList: Can you provide examples of real-world applications where AIP’s AI engines and infrastructure have demonstrated significant impact and success?

Latif: AIP Labs’ large-scale deployment in Hungary has been nothing short of remarkable. In the first few months, the company’s innovative Digital Dermatology Hospital platform processed over 35,000 patient cases, showcasing its ability to seamlessly guide patients through the entire care journey – from submitting cases to receiving diagnoses, treatments, and prescriptions. The platform’s efficiency is astounding, with an average processing speed of 30 cases per hour and each case being fully serviced in just 90 to 120 seconds, compared to 10-15 minutes in traditional in-clinic visits – a staggering 7x increase in productivity. Equally impressive is the system’s ability to adapt to diverse patient demographics. Cases were submitted by individuals spanning all age groups, including a 99-year-old user, and from both urban and rural regions. This broad reach, coupled with the extensive positive feedback from patients and clinicians, validates the urgent societal need for AIP Labs’ transformative technology.

AIPDerm successfully converted a small pilot into a full multi-year partnership with the leading insurance provider in Slovakia, Dovera. Dovera has over 1.6 million Slovakian insurance members (30%+ of the population of Slovakia). After running an initial small-scale pilot for about four months, it has evolved the service into a full partnership, with Dovera now broadly marketing the platform to its entire consumer base. Dovera has already seen a marked increase in enrollment, given that the AIPDerm service has acted as an effective tool to engage existing members better and recruit new members to Dovera’s insurance program, given how highly relevant dermatology is to most households.

The FutureList: How have the healthtech community, partners, and clients responded to your innovation, and how do you engage with your user base?

Latif: Over the past decade, our award-winning team has conducted presentations at numerous AI and dermatology conferences and has published research in various leading journals, totalling 50+ publications and 3,000+ citations.

AIPDerm’s active collaboration with Semmelweis University’s Department of Dermatology over the past few years provided direct clinical collaboration and feedback from clinicians through early evaluation of the system and subsequent utilisation of the system in live-patient interactions.

Also, AIPDerm’s consumer interaction and feedback access from patients and clinicians across Hungary and Slovakia have provided continuous feedback and validation across performance, usability, and the interface.

The FutureList: How does your innovation integrate with existing systems and technologies within healthcare institutions?

Latif: AIP Labs’ innovation seamlessly integrates with existing healthcare systems and technologies, demonstrating its strong focus on interoperability and efficiency. The platform has proven to integrate with multiple national health systems, individual clinics, e-prescription providers, and leading insurance providers while remaining fully licensed and compliant with medical device regulations and data privacy laws. At the core of AIP Labs’ offering is a fully integrated end-to-end system that leverages advanced AI, big data, and analytical technologies, including deep learning, computer vision, and graphical modelling. This comprehensive integration strategy extends to prescription systems, with AIP successfully coordinating with national e-prescription platforms in Spain, Hungary, and Slovakia and supporting e-prescriptions in various other geographies. Recognising the challenges of direct integration with national systems, which can be highly complex and time-consuming, AIP has adopted a flexible approach by integrating with national systems through partner organisations, ensuring its innovative platform can seamlessly operate within existing healthcare infrastructure and optimise clinical workflows for healthcare institutions.

The FutureList: Are there areas where external collaboration or expertise could significantly accelerate your progress or amplify the impact of your innovation?

Latif: Yes, access to partnerships and initiatives in Africa, where we believe our platform can be wielded as a revolutionary tool for democratising free access, crowdsourcing, and connecting global clinical expertise in servicing local cases.

The FutureList: What measures does AIP take to ensure regulatory and data compliance and adherence to industry standards in developing and deploying AI solutions?

Latif: With assistance from our regulatory consultants, CEplus, we are currently approved as an MDD/MDR Class I device and will maintain this classification for the coming years. We plan to achieve Class II device classification over the next 12-18 months, allowing our system to provide classifications for more risky skin cancers.

Our platform meets the definition of a software-as-a-medical device under Regulation (EU) 2017/745 (EU Medical Device Regulation (MDR)  and must, therefore, meet standards related to the safety and efficacy of AI as it assists doctors in making treatment decisions for their patients.

Also, our platform inherently collects personally identifiable information under the definition of this regulation, including patient name, date of birth, address, Hungarian health insurance number (TAJ), etc. As a result, we must ask for user consent to collect this data, disclose the use and purpose of the information, and allow users to export and delete their information if desired. We comply with strict data privacy and security rules to protect confidential data.

All procedures performed by AIPDerm in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the National Center for Health Statistics Research Ethics Review Board and with the 1964 Declaration of Helsinki and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

The Semmelweis Medical University Ethics Board has reviewed and approved all developments and collaborations.

The FutureList: How does AIP address potential biases in AI algorithms when developing AI solutions for healthcare applications?

Latif: To reduce bias and ensure equal explanatory power, AIP has addressed imbalances in the proportion of images from underrepresented or rare conditions or skin types, except for skin diseases that occur with such low frequency in Māori that there are insufficient images to enable meaningful comparison.

Mitigation involves continuously monitoring the AI system and making necessary algorithm adjustments to counteract identified biases.

Regular analysis and updates ensure that the system remains accurate and fair for all patient groups, particularly those who have historically faced disparities in healthcare.

AIP has performed extensive testing, and validation results demonstrate that AIPDerm’s AI engine is competent and stable at identifying never-before-seen cases, such as in new geographies, and at identifying inconsistent biases, types, and qualities of images. It ultimately maintains its ability to consistently generalise to those cases based on its comprehensive training and development.

The FutureList: Where do you envision taking your innovations in the next 5-10 years? Can you provide insights into AIP’s plan and strategy for expanding its market presence?

Latif: After evolving the technology and proof-of-concept at scale through pilots over the coming 12 to 18 months, we project reaching over 13 countries by 2028.  Our flow-through to profitability comes thanks to our high-margin and scalable robust structure, allowing us to grow organically and profitably without relying on burning external capital to achieve unsustainable user growth. Although we require critical support for development and deployment costs, the company will become fully self-sustaining within three years. We will benefit from significant relationships with top government officials in EU countries and with the C-suite of private insurance providers. The media coverage from our Hungarian pilot, our Slovakia partnership (Dovera), and our publications in leading medical journals will render significant media attention given the massive potential of the platform and its societal, economic, geopolitical, and environmental impact. By 2028, we plan to be fully operational in 13 countries: Hungary, Spain, Romania, Italy, Czech, Slovakia, Poland, Brazil, Mexico, Argentina, Columbia, United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. Additionally, we hope to launch our pro-bono service for Africa in the next 18 months, allowing our elegant design and unique coordination to facilitate the global processing of cases by clinicians from every country to address a pipeline of African instances where access to health care is beyond deficient.

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