If you’re worried the healthcare sector may lag behind others in the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and digital technology, you might be feel better knowing that people like Dartmouth Institute alumna Akanksha Karwar MPH’13 are working on that. As a part of GE Healthcare, Karwar currently is leading a command center project at a 13-hospital system in Pennsylvania and New Jersey that utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to solve problems common to large healthcare systems, such as, long boarding time and delays in care progression. Hospitals are under pressure to operate in a regulated environment and deliver the highest patient outcomes while balancing resource utilization and preventing adverse events, Karwar says, noting that her work is helping to make it possible for hospitals to meet these challenges.  

“We’re using AI in every other field except healthcare, which is just scratching the surface, so being able to use data, of which we have a ton in healthcare, as well as the capabilities we now have in machine learning and AI, could enable us to solve many of the problems hospitals are now facing,” Karwar says. 

As an undergraduate, Karwar knew she wanted her career to be dedicated to fixing healthcare but not, as she says, “at the patient level but at more of a population level.” To do that she knew she needed to be able to work on improving health policies and systems, so she decided to pursue a degree in public health at Dartmouth. Landing in consulting was due to the “tight network” at The Dartmouth Institute: “An alumna actually connected me and that’s how I ended up in consulting and where I am today. Future goals —I love what I do—we’re getting a lot of momentum and I never want to leave. We’re innovating healthcare and that’s what The Dartmouth Institute taught me.

"The best part of being at Dartmouth, and being part of the community, is that you can make what you want of it, and everyone around you is there to support you.

I wanted to do something in global health and faculty members connected me to someone who could help me out. My internship ended up being in Rwanda at a public HIV clinic—and it was an absolute dream. Everyone in The Dartmouth Institute community came together to make this happen for me."