Between December 2023 and May 2024, we have interviewed 10 OPO leaders from across the country. One observation has been the existence of conflicting visions for AI adoption.
Some leaders believe that there needs to be a coordinated, top-down approach to AI adoption to ensure fairness and equity. This would likely be led by government regulators. However, this is likely to be a slower process.
Others see a need for a more bottom-up approach to facilitate experimentation and innovation. This can support the identification of best practices, but not all OPOs are equally able to participate. OPOs that are bigger or have more resources will be better able to benefit from AI.
The bottom line is that the exact impact of AI on OPO practices is unknown. We are hoping to generate evidence on how much AI can help as part of our planned field experiments using UNOS’s SimUNet. There are pros and cons of both a top-down and bottom-up approach in the adoption of AI. We are currently working on drafting a paper to summarize our findings and encourage more dialogue on this subject. In the meantime, we want to know what you think!