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Shaping the Future of Health Innovation and AI
Alexander Khalessi, MD, MBA, shares a vision for how academic medicine can lead the next era of innovation and artificial intelligence in health care
Story by:
- Leslie Aquinde
–
ljaquinde@ucsd.edu
Explore the 2026 IssueDiscoveries Magazine
Published Date
August 19, 2026
Story by:
- Leslie Aquinde
–
ljaquinde@ucsd.edu
Explore the 2026 IssueDiscoveries Magazine
Article Content
This story is from the 2026 issue of Discoveries, a UC San Diego Health Sciences magazine
Artificial intelligence (AI), digital health tools, wearable sensor platforms and personalized data are transforming medicine at an unprecedented pace. Academic medical centers face a critical responsibility of ensuring innovation improves care while maintaining patient safety, equity, trust and clinical integrity
At UC San Diego Health, innovation is shaped by its position within a world-class public research university. The strategy is intentionally end to end, translating discovery science, engineering and data into clinically validated solutions that scale responsibly, improve reliability and generate real-world impact
Alexander Khalessi, MD, MBA,chief innovation officer at UC San Diego Health, discussed why governance matters, how academic medicine is uniquely positioned to lead responsible technology adoption and how UC San Diego will define the future of medicine. Khalessi is a professor of neurological surgery, radiology and neurosciences at UC San Diego School of Medicine
What AI-driven and digital innovations is UC San Diego Health advancing today, and how are they shaping the future of care?
At UC San Diego Health, we believe there is a special opportunity to shape and develop the technologies that will improve human health. Our vision rests on six pillars: translating biological discovery into new therapies, delivering personalized health at population scale, developing agile industry partnerships, advancing health data science through the electronic health record (EHR), building organizational AI literacy and shaping national policy. These priorities converge to strengthen the reliability of our clinical, patient-facing and operational workflows.
Once we discover the right treatment in the care of an individual patient, we are committed to hitting the same mark for every patient. For example, our central focus has been shifting away from episodic care toward continuous patient monitoring through a growing ecosystem of digital and wearable technologies. From early disease intervention to complication avoidance and chronic care management, our expert care teams are developing actionable decision rules to assess individual baselines and take decisive clinical action.
How do you ensure AI is adopted responsibly?
Responsible AI is very intentional and actionable. It begins with governance structures to evaluate tools before deployment in patient care environments, continuously assess for changes in performance accuracy post-implementation and validate their clinical impact through rigorous evidence and academic study
Transparency is no less important. AI tools rely on their training data sets; poorly applied orlation, we recognize our responsibility to evaluate tools for safety, equity and real-world performance over time
Responsible integration also requires cultural readiness. Disruptive technologies such as AI can feel exclusionary if clinicians and leaders believe they cannot fully participate in shaping them. We are intentionally building AI literacy across the organization so teams understand how these tools work, where their limitations are and how they can responsibly integrate them into clinical and operational workflows
Technology should augment human expertise, not replace it. When clinicians are involved from the beginning and patients understand how AI supports their care, trust follows. While we acknowledge the human-in-the-loop debate, we trust our subject matter experts to help define that balance with the broader scientific community
How does the academic mission influence innovation strategy?
We are an academic health system situated within a leading research institution. We are teaching tomorrow’s doctors to develop and apply these tools. We are helping our biotech partners surface the most pressing use cases, and we are helping our patients live their best lives
By integrating discovery science, engineering, data science and clinical care, we operate as a living laboratory where insights from care inform research, and research rapidly returns to improve care delivery. Our integrated Health Sciences structure and campus partnerships allow UC San Diego to advance the academic literature while simultaneously improving how care is delivered in real time.
What excites you most about the future?
What excites me most is the convergence of biomedical discovery, powerful computational tools and a health system committed to translating both into better care. When those elements reinforce one another, innovation becomes transformative
Innovation only matters if it strengthens trust. Every advance we pursue is evaluated through the lens of benefit, safety and equity. Our goal is simple: Ensure these technologies meaningfully support clinicians in the moments that matter most and measurably improve outcomes for patients
At UC San Diego Health, we’re positioned to lead not just because of our technology but because of our values grounded in science, engineering and clinical excellence — all in service to our community. We’re building the future of health care together with our patients and partners
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