Artificial intelligence and the electrocardiogram: A modern renaissance

Abstract

Integrating Artificial Intelligence (AI) with electrocardiograms (ECG) represents a transformative shift in cardiovascular medicine, marking a modern renaissance of this traditional diagnostic technique. This article explores recent advancements in AI-enhanced ECG technologies, highlighting their potential to improve diagnostic accuracy, predict cardiovascular events, and enable personalized patient care. AI-driven ECG interpretation has demonstrated groundbreaking capabilities in the field of both structural and electrical heart diseases. Furthermore, deep learning techniques have expanded diagnostic capabilities by identifying subtle ECG patterns invisible to the human eye, improving the detection of several cardiac disorders. The increasing integration of AI-ECG into wearable technologies extends cardiac monitoring beyond conventional clinical settings, providing continuous, real-time health assessment. Despite these advancements, the widespread adoption of AI-ECG faces several challenges, such as the need for high-quality training data, ensuring algorithm generalizability across diverse populations, addressing bias in model training, and meeting critical regulatory and ethical standards. Moreover, concerns regarding explainability, physician deskilling, legal accountability, and the lack of high-quality studies proving improved patient outcomes remain key obstacles. By enhancing precision in detecting cardiovascular conditions and expanding access to proactive heart health monitoring, AI-enhanced ECG technology holds immense potential for reshaping cardiovascular diagnostics and management, always aiming at maintaining physician trust and patient safety.