--- title: "This AI Knows When You’ll Die and Its Creators Don’t Know How" description: "Researchers at a U.S. healthcare provider trained an AI to predict when you'll die by which patients were at a higher risk of dying within the next year." date: "2019-11-11" modified: "2019-11-11" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/neoscope/ai-knows-when-youll-die-how" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Developments" - "Health & Medicine" tags: - "ai" - "artificial intelligence" - "death" --- # This AI Knows When You’ll Die and Its Creators Don’t Know How ![Researchers at a U.S. healthcare provider trained an AI to predict when you'll die by which patients were at a higher risk of dying within the next year.]() *\Image: Salvatore P/Victor Tangermann\* Researchers from Pennsylvania healthcare provider Geisinger have trained an AI to predict which patients are at a higher risk of dying within the next year, [*New Scientist* reports](). They fed the AI 1.77 million electrocardiogram (ECG) logs — measured in voltage over time — from 400,000 patients, in order to detect patterns that could indicate future cardiac problems including heart attacks and atrial fibrillation. The results were impressive and a little scary. The AI model performed better than existing methods, according to the researchers, at distinguishing between patients who would die within a year and those who survived. "No matter what, the voltage-based model was always better than any model you could build out of things that we already measure from an ECG," Brandon Fornwalt, lead researcher of the study at Geisinger, told *New Scientist*. The model even detected heart problems in patients who were previously cleared by cardiologists. "That finding suggests that the model is seeing things that humans probably can’t see, or at least that we just ignore and think are normal," Fornwalt added. "AI can potentially teach us things that we’ve been maybe misinterpreting for decades." This isn't the only attempt at harnessing the power of machine learning to predict death. Last year, researchers at Google in Mountain View, California [created a predictive model]() using electronic health records to predict a patient’s length of stay and time of discharge, as well as the time of death. AI models have also been used to diagnose heart disease and lung cancer — in some instances [more accurately]() than human doctors. But there's one major catch with Geisinger's AI, and many other models as well: they [struggle to explain how the AI works](). And that has professionals worried about making any determinations based on these kinds of algorithms. ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()