Cancer specialists are asking AI to prep their toughest cases before they even walk into the room. Miami's own cancer center already uses it to catch what radiologists can miss.
Margarita Racsa, a Daytona Beach radiation oncologist, co-chairs the American College of Radiation Oncology's AI subcommittee. She recently laid out exactly how AI is reshaping tumor board workflows.
A Three-Phase Framework for Tumor Boards
Racsa breaks AI's role into three phases. Before the meeting, AI compiles pathology, imaging, labs and clinical history into one comprehensive summary for every clinician involved.
"What often happens today is that some clinicians have access to certain information and others do not," Racsa said, describing the fragmentation AI is meant to fix.
During the meeting, AI can correlate a case against standard guidelines from groups like the National Comprehensive Cancer Network. After the meeting, it can draft documentation and even a patient-legible summary of the board's recommendations.
The One Use Case Racsa Calls Most Important
Racsa named a unified electronic health record as the single highest-yield AI use case in all of medicine, not just oncology.
Cancer patients often see a primary care physician, cardiologist, oncologist and pulmonologist. Each one often runs on different systems that don't talk to each other. Racsa said that fragmentation is one of the most pressing safety issues in healthcare today.
Where Miami Cancer Institute Already Built This
Baptist Health's Miami Cancer Institute has already put a version of Racsa's framework into daily practice, specifically in breast cancer screening.
Breast radiologists there use AI to help find cancers on mammograms that are undetectable to the human eye. The tool also lets them read more studies in less time.
Baptist Health Cancer Care has grown into Florida's largest cancer program. It ranks in the top 10% nationally for treating the most complex cancer cases.
Governance Is the Part Nobody Solved Yet
Racsa was direct about the risk of moving too fast. "The pace of AI implementation is, in many sectors, outpacing the development of oversight structures," she said.
She was equally direct about AI's limits. "There is no replacement for clinical judgment," she said, describing what she calls the "human in the loop" as essential to every application.
What This Means for Miami's Cancer Patients
Racsa's national framework and Miami Cancer Institute's own mammography tool point at the same underlying shift. AI is moving from an experimental add-on to infrastructure oncology teams build their workflows around.
For patients, the promise is faster answers and fewer things falling through the cracks between specialists. Whether governance catches up with that promise is the open question every cancer center, including Miami's, is still working through.
Billionaire Wealth Hit $15T. A Miami Investor Cashed In