April 1, 2023
MIT Sloan School of Management News: C3.ai DTI COVIDAnalytics PI and MIT Sloan Professor Dimitris Bertsimas is now helping redesign the national lung transplant allocation system using data analytics and artificial intelligence.
As of March 9, 2023, all donated lungs across the US are allocated based on a new policy, developed with the assistance of researchers from MIT Sloan School of Management. The policy considers a range of factors to determine which patients in need of donor lungs will be prioritized to get them. The policy change is predicted to reduce overall deaths and increase access for many patients waiting for a lung transplant.
“The work underscores the power of data, artificial intelligence, and optimization to achieve equitable and efficient allocations of donated lungs,” Bertsimas said. “We are hopeful that our work will extend to all other organ allocation systems.”
“A new protocol that we helped develop for kidneys will soon be presented to OPTN policymakers for consideration.” [The Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network (OPTN) is the nation’s organ transplant system.]
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