Supported by a three-year provincial investment, the initiative will ensure locally developed AI health innovations deliver long-term benefits to patients across the province.
Today at Upper Bound, Amii launched the Health Innovation Lab, a $10M initiative in partnership with the Government of Alberta designed to accelerate the development and adoption of AI-driven healthcare. Over the next three years, Amii will lead the Lab in bridging the gap between world-class AI research and clinical applications to improve health outcomes for Albertans.
By moving AI from theory to the frontline of healthcare, Amii is ensuring that AI solutions can enable both world-class patient care and provincial economic prosperity.
Through the Health Innovation Lab, Amii is bridging excellence in research with excellence in care. By translating our world-leading AI into clinical tools, we are empowering clinicians and patients to achieve an outsized impact. This allows us to apply our deep technical expertise directly to the province’s health priorities—ensuring Alberta-made innovation drives both economic growth and a better healthcare experience for everyone.
- Cam Linke, Amii CEO
Artificial intelligence has the potential to transform how healthcare is delivered, but only if we move innovations out of the lab and into real-world use. This investment ensures Alberta innovators can work responsibly with health data to deliver solutions that improve care for patients, strengthen our health system and create long-term economic value for the province."
- Nate Glubish, Minister, Technology and Innovation
A Legacy of Excellence in AI Health
Amii has long been a global leader in the intersection of AI and medicine. The Health Innovation Lab is the natural evolution of decades of work by Amii Fellows and Canada CIFAR AI Chairs who have already proven that AI can solve high-stakes clinical challenges.
The Jenkins AI Scribe: Led by researchers including Amii Fellow and Canada CIFAR AI Chair Ross Mitchell, this AI-powered tool is currently scaling to support over 850 healthcare providers across Alberta. By automating clinical notes, Jenkins is directly tackling physician burnout and reclaiming thousands of hours for patient care.
Medo AI: Co-founded by Amii Fellow and Canada CIFAR AI Chair Jacob Jaremko, this local startup took a vision for a "21st-century stethoscope" from an academic paper to a global commercial success. By automating ultrasound analysis, they significantly improved diagnostic accuracy for hip abnormalities in infants—a journey that led to their acquisition by medical tech company Exo in 2022.
Amii is well-known for its deep technical benches of world-renowned experts who understand the nuances of medical data.
Mohamed Abdalla: Amii fellow and expert in natural language processing, clinical informatics, and AI ethics. He focuses on identifying and mitigating risks in clinical AI deployments to ensure tools are effective and equitable.
Craig Jones: Amii Fellow and specialist in explainable and uncertainty-aware AI, Dr. Jones focuses on medical imaging (MRI, CT, and ultrasound) to improve automated disease diagnosis and clinical decision support.
Amber Simpson: Amii Fellow and expert in biomedical data science, Dr. Simpson develops computational strategies to translate complex biological data into real-world health solutions, ensuring research infrastructure is patient-centred and scalable.
Lazar Atanackovic: Amii Fellow and specialist in generative modeling and causality. He develops machine learning methods to model cellular systems that can transform healthcare through AI-driven insights into single-cell biology and molecular design.
Improving Efficiencies and Patient Care
While the economic benefits are clear, the impact on our healthcare system is equally profound. By integrating AI into frontline care, we are driving efficiencies that were previously out of reach.
AI-driven solutions are uniquely positioned to address the bottlenecks that currently strain our clinics and hospitals. By integrating predictive tools and automated workflows, the Health Innovation Lab aims to support projects that:
Reduce Wait Times: Streamlining diagnostic processes so patients receive results and treatment plans faster.
Enhance Accuracy: Utilizing "uncertainty-aware" models to assist clinicians in making high-precision decisions in medical imaging.
Drive Cost Savings: Reducing the administrative burden on frontline staff, allowing them to focus on human-centric care while lowering operational overhead.
Enable Early Detection: Identifying subtle patterns in health data to catch diseases sooner, significantly improving treatment success and recovery rates.
Building the Future of Health
The Health Innovation Lab is a signal to the world that Alberta is the premier destination for health-tech innovation. The initiative is a step forward in engineering AI tools that make healthcare more dependable, efficient, and accessible.
Through this collaborative effort, Amii is ensuring that AI solutions made in Alberta are nurtured into products that save lives, create jobs, and solidify our province's role as a global leader in AI science and its practical application.
Help us build the future of AI-enabled healthcare in Alberta. Submit an expression of interest here: [LINK]