Arkansas Health Systems Embrace AI & Advanced Tech to Improve Outcomes

Baptist Health's iCometrix AI integration highlights parts of the brain to make reading MRI scans easier. (Courtesy Baptist Health)

Arkansas often scores poorly on health measurements, but hospitals and research institutions across the state want to change that reputation.

Some are integrating new technologies into existing processes, like Baptist Health system’s use of artificial intelligence to help detect hemorrhage, Arkansas Heart Hospital’s innovative new breast CT scanner or St. Bernards’ robotic-assisted surgeries.

Others, like the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and UA-Fayetteville’s Institute for Integrative and Innovative Research, are inventing new ways to diagnose and treat patients and figuring out how to commercialize those new technologies.

AI Joins the Team at Baptist Health

“I firmly believe, and have seen, that AI is definitely going to help us change the way we deliver care and make significant safety improvements and improvements in patient care,” says Jessica Rivera, vice president of hospital operations at the North Little Rock Baptist Health Medical Center.

Rivera, in October 2024, had the privilege of launching Baptist Health’s first AI integration: the iCometrix neuroradiology AI platform. The AI software operates in the background of the hospital’s MRI machine, analyzing images in real time to assist human radiologists in diagnosing miniscule microbleeds in Alzheimer’s patients.

The Baptist hospital in NLR commonly provides early-stage Alzheimer’s patients with Leqembi, a drug designed to reduce cognitive decline; the drug is administered through intravenous infusion and carries the risk of brain bleeding as a side effect.

Rivera says, “(The software) takes the image that the MRI creates, then through AI, it enhances the image so that the radiologists and neurologists can detect microbleeding in the brain quicker and more efficiently.”

The software even color codes potential problem areas in MRI scans for a human radiologist to take a closer look. Rivera says no microbleeds have been missed since the technology was implemented, nor have any patients been misdiagnosed.

The American College of Radiology in April partnered with iCometrix’s developers to further refine the tool for Alzheimer’s diagnoses. Rivera says she expects to see similar technology applied across radiologic modalities.

“I’m excited about the use of AI in health care,” Rivera says.

I3R Researchers Developing Neural Stimulator to Restore Lost Limb Function

Dewey Hickey lived for 75 years without his left hand. In 2024, he became the first person in Arkansas, and only the second in the world, to receive a neural-enabled prosthesis developed by researchers at the University of Arkansas’ Institute for Integrative and Innovative Research (I3R).

Prosthetic devices have existed for thousands of years and have accordingly advanced with time. Many prosthetic hands can open and close in order to grasp objects by responding to muscle stimulation. But the device developed at I3R allows the patient to “feel” what they are grabbing with haptic feedback.

“It works by stimulating nerve fibers in the upper arm,” says Dr. James Abbas, a UA professor who’s been working on this technology for more than 20 years. “If we stimulate the nerve fibers that used to carry sensory information from the hand, the person feels it as if they touched something with their hand, even many years after the amputation.”

The sensation the patient feels is more akin to pressure than texture — he can tell how much force he’s using to pet a cat, say, but he probably won’t feel the cat’s soft fur. But, through rigorous, ongoing testing, Abbas said he’s seen patients adapt to the new sensations well.

“As people use the system that gives them sensations, they seem to develop a much stronger connection to the prosthesis; it seems that getting sensations as they use it makes it more like a hand, and less like a tool,” he says.

I3R’s neural stimulator has been granted an investigational device exemption by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration so that it can be tested and further developed for eventual commercialization. Dr. Ranu Jung, executive director of I3R and one of the principal researchers on the prosthetic study, says the technology could be applied to other parts of the body in the future.

“We might be able to target nerve fibers in other applications, very selectively, to be able to influence end organ function. In this prosthetic system, we’re stimulating signals to the brain, but it could be some other part of the body,” she says.

Arkansas Heart Hospital Adopts Breakthrough Breast Screening

Breast cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in the world; approximately 1 in 8 women in the U.S. will develop breast cancer. At Little Rock’s Arkansas Heart Hospital, a new breast imaging technology is providing hope for better outcomes.

The Koning Vera Breast CT machine is a pain-free, 3D breast scanner. It replaces the traditional mammogram’s painful compression with a simplified procedure where the patient lies on a table, no uncomfortable manual or machine manipulation needed.

“When we got it, we were only the third or fourth in the U.S. to have one,” says hospital CEO Dr. Bruce Murphy, formerly one of the state’s leading cardiologists. “I see it as breakthrough technology. A woman who’s in her 20s now – by the time she’s recommended to get one, mammography will be gone.”

Arkansas Heart Hospital is the only medical facility in the state currently offering the Vera Breast CT; Murphy says the medical value of the tech was quickly evident, partly due to the immediate imaging readouts by technicians.

Murphy says, “The resolution is so good that, frankly, if you know what you’re looking for, you can almost read your own scan. The difference in spatial and temporal resolution is the difference between an analog TV and a high-definition digital TV.”

The CT scan also produces a 3D view of the tissue, providing even greater clarity because imaging technicians are able to see cross-sectional views of the entire breast.

St. Bernards Ahead on Adopting Robotic-assisted Surgeons

St. Bernards has been ahead of the curve on robotic-assisted surgery for a while, having adopted the technology in 2008. The Jonesboro-based hospital has gone through several iterations of robotic surgeons since then, and in 2024 St. Bernards purchased the Intuitive da Vinci 5 system, which Dr. Jessica Hobby says is the hospital’s greatest stride yet in making the operating room a safer and more efficient space.

“Early studies are showing it’s translating into faster OR times. It’s really streamlining things,” Hobby says. “You have wristed instruments that articulate, so you have a finer, sharper, more precise operation for the patient, and you can do things more safely.”

The DV5 system is the first to integrate haptic feedback, giving the human surgeon performing an operation a clearer sense of the amount of pressure they’re putting on their instruments and the patient. The visual monitor the human surgeon watches the procedure from is also sharper, and in 3D.

Hobby says the DV5 system collects data from each surgery, which individual surgeons can review and learn from. Surgeons in training can also practice with the robot. Officials say one of the most critical upgrades the new system boasts is the ability to update its software.

BioVentures Brings UAMS Research to Market

“It takes an extraordinary amount of money to bring a drug to market; it’s a lot of investment,” says Eric Peterson, president of BioVentures LLC, the technology transfer arm of the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.

BioVentures helps UAMS faculty, students and clinicians commercialize inventions — from new drugs and treatment techniques to novel applications of existing technologies and specialized equipment inventions — through assistance with intellectual property management and other startup support, like funding.

“(The protected IP) allows us, then, to market it either to a company that wants to develop it, or the faculty member can start their own company,” Peterson says.

For example, Dr. Kevin Sexton, former director of BioVentures and now vice chair for innovation at Vanderbilt University, developed with colleagues a novel way for automated systems to quantify blood loss by analyzing waveforms emitted by standard IV lines. He and Dr. Joseph Sanford, director of the UAMS Institute for Digital Health & Innovation, have submitted six invention disclosures to BioVentures for additional applications of the same core technology.

“And as computing power improves year after year, you get opportunities to apply techniques that would previously not be deployable at the bedside,” Sanford says.

Sanford said several of his office’s faculty have mentored members of the Fuel Accelerator’s Health Tech cohorts. He says such collaboration and partnerships drive progress in an oftentimes slow industry.

“These are projects that take five to 10 years to come to market sometimes, so they don’t always have quite the same startup enthusiasm or entrepreneurial pathway that others do,” he says.

An ongoing research interest for Sanford is on improving rural health outcomes through digital tools. Even incremental increases in efficiency could provide new opportunities for expanding digital health services, like telemedicine or remote patient monitoring.

“Sometimes you grow by growing your clinical chassis, and sometimes you grow by making 10-20% improvements in areas that seem unrelated but are actually infrastructurally deeply interconnected,” Sanford says.