Artificial Intelligence Applications in Healthcare Sector: Ethical and Legal Challenges

Recently, artificial intelligence (AI) has been one of the hottest topics in the technological world. Although it is involved in many domains, it was recently involved in the healthcare sector. AI can be used for diagnostics, drug development, treatment personalization, gene editing, disease prediction, and many more. It helps to improve healthcare services by benefiting medical professionals, hospitals, and patients. Saudi Arabia has a particular interest in the healthcare sector, and it has a clear vision for the future, which points toward the development of AI-based technologies. Few studies investigated the use of AI in Saudi healthcare, and most of them focused on healthcare employees' perceptions. This study is beyond the focus of the existing works. It aims at: 1) presenting the main AI-based healthcare applications; 2) exploring the use of AI in the Saudi healthcare sector; 3) addressing their ethical and legal challenges, along with the policy questions in Saudi healthcare; 4) studying the benefits of these AI-based applications and the acceptance of professionals to use AI in daily practice; 5) introducing the new Personal Data Protection Law (PDPL) in Saudi Arabia; and 6) discussing the importance of AI to the future of Saudi healthcare. To this purpose, a survey was distributed among four main Saudi hospitals. The findings showed that AI should not only lead to better health but also save manpower and simplify the healthcare processes. The respondents agreed that AI helps reflect human intellectual competencies and pushes its limits.