14 Eastern Ontario hospitals join forces to establish standards for responsible AI use

New regional collaborative will develop shared tools to evaluate artificial intelligence, strengthen patient safety and reduce duplication across healthcare organizations.

Fourteen hospital organizations across Eastern Ontario are joining forces to establish a coordinated approach to the safe, ethical and responsible use of artificial intelligence in healthcare.

The Regional AI Governance Collaborative, co-led by Queensway Carleton Hospital in Ottawa and Pembroke Regional Hospital, will bring together expertise from participating hospitals to develop common policies, risk assessment frameworks, vendor evaluation tools and ethical guidelines.

Announced November 9, the initiative is intended to help hospitals make informed decisions about adopting AI technologies while maintaining responsibility for their own procurement, implementation and oversight.

The collaborative will focus on sharing expertise and reducing duplicated work, particularly among smaller community hospitals that may have limited resources to independently evaluate increasingly complex AI systems.

Addressing the challenges of AI adoption

Artificial intelligence is becoming an increasingly important part of healthcare operations, with applications ranging from clinical documentation and diagnostic support to scheduling and administrative processes.

However, adopting these technologies introduces questions about patient safety, data privacy, cybersecurity, transparency and accountability.

Hospitals must assess whether AI products are clinically appropriate, how patient information will be protected and what safeguards are necessary to prevent unintended consequences.

Currently, many healthcare organizations independently conduct similar assessments of the same technologies.

The Regional AI Governance Collaborative aims to streamline this work by creating shared evaluation resources that participating hospitals can adapt to their individual needs.

Rather than developing separate frameworks from the ground up, hospitals will be able to draw on common expertise and evidence-informed assessment methods.

Importantly, the collaborative will not approve AI products on behalf of its members. Each hospital will continue to determine which technologies to adopt and how they will be monitored.

Eight principles to guide responsible AI

The participating organizations have established eight foundational principles to guide their approach to artificial intelligence.

These principles address accountability, patient safety, fairness, transparency, human oversight, technical robustness, patient autonomy and fiscal responsibility.

Together, they are intended to help hospitals balance the potential benefits of AI with the need to protect patients, maintain public trust and use healthcare resources responsibly.

The collaborative recognizes that effective AI governance requires input from multiple disciplines, including physicians, clinical operations, information technology, privacy, cybersecurity, ethics, finance and hospital leadership.

More than 20 healthcare leaders representing these areas, as well as patient perspectives, have already contributed to the initiative.

Partnerships with research and technology experts

The initiative is co-led by Lindsay Wyers, vice-president of transformation, innovation and strategic partnerships and chief digital and privacy officer at Queensway Carleton Hospital, and Scott Coombes, vice-president and chief financial officer at Pembroke Regional Hospital.

The collaborative has engaged Info-Tech Research Group to support the development of practical and scalable governance processes.

It is also partnering with the University of Ottawa, where PhD student Amanda Maria Kutenski will contribute to the development of an ethical AI framework and decision-making tool.

These partnerships are intended to provide additional research and technical expertise as participating hospitals establish their shared approach.

Fourteen hospital organizations participating

The collaborative brings together a broad range of healthcare organizations serving communities across Eastern Ontario.

Participating partners include Arnprior Regional Health, Bruyère Health, Deep River & District Health, Hawkesbury and District General Hospital, Hôpital Glengarry Memorial Hospital, Hôpital Montfort, Kemptville District Hospital, Mississippi River Health Alliance, Pembroke Regional Hospital, Queensway Carleton Hospital, The Royal, St. Francis Memorial Hospital, Renfrew Victoria Hospital and Winchester District Memorial Hospital.

The diversity of participating organizations is significant, bringing together hospitals with different clinical services, patient populations and operational resources.

By pooling expertise, the group hopes to make responsible AI governance more accessible across the region.

Next steps for the collaborative

Initial planning sessions have already produced foundational AI principles, proposed governance structures, early charter concepts and a regional roadmap.

The next phase will focus on formalizing governance arrangements, identifying AI technologies currently being used across participating hospitals and evaluating priority applications through consistent risk assessment methods.

Over time, the collaborative intends to introduce shared processes for assessing new AI technologies and monitoring higher-risk applications.

The approach could also provide a model for other Canadian hospital networks seeking to coordinate AI oversight.

As healthcare organizations increasingly explore artificial intelligence, establishing consistent governance standards may help reduce duplication, support informed technology decisions and strengthen patient safety.

For Canadian hospitals, the Eastern Ontario initiative represents a shift toward regional collaboration in managing the opportunities and risks associated with AI adoption.

The collaborative remains in its development phase, and its impact on costs, clinical outcomes and patient safety has not yet been measured.

Primary source: Queensway Carleton Hospital

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