Artificial Intelligence in Healthcare Conference

Thursday-Friday, May 7–8, 2026 — Cambridge, MA

Artificial intelligence (AI) is considered by many to be the next industrial revolution, and AI is finding applications across many, perhaps most, economic sectors. There are fundamental unanswered questions in the development of AI tools and in the degree to which they can help or harm healthcare quality and efficiency.

With the support of the NIH, the NBER Center for Aging and Health Research will host a two day in-person conference on the role of AI in healthcare in Cambridge, Massachusetts, on May 7–8 (Thursday-Friday) 2026. The conference will be organized by Nikhil Agarwal (MIT and NBER) and Kevin Schulman (Stanford University).
We welcome perspectives from economics and other disciplines such as computer science, public health, and medicine on these issues. The conference is not limited to NBER affiliates. All individuals are welcome to suggest a paper.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:

The potential for AI to reduce administrative burden, fraud, and alleviate costs
Opportunities to improve productivity, operations, and efficiency with AI
AI as a medical decision support tool, both inside the health system and through novel channels
Regulatory and governance issues for the use of AI in healthcare

To be considered for presentation at the meeting, upload papers or extended abstracts to, https://conference.nber.org/confsubmit/backend/cfp?id=AIHs26, no later than 11:59pm ET on Sunday, February 22, 2026. Authors chosen to present papers will be notified by March 6, 2026.

The NBER will cover hotel and economy-class conference travel for up to two authors per paper.

Please share this call with others who may be interested in submitting a paper. Logistical questions about this meeting should be directed to confer@nber.org; other questions, to Sarah Holmes Berk at sholmes@nber.org.