Lung Cancer Europe’s position on artificial intelligence in lung cancer care

Artificial intelligence is becoming part of healthcare, including lung cancer care, from helping analyse scans to supporting earlier detection. Used well, it could help people affected by lung cancer. Done poorly, it could cause harm. Today we are publishing our position statement, setting out what responsible AI in lung cancer care needs to look like.

Our position rests on three principles.

Trust in AI has to be earned, not assumed

Too little trust holds back tools that could help. Too much trust, placed in AI whose limits are not understood, can be just as harmful. Trust has to be built on transparency, evidence, and honesty about what a tool can and cannot do.

AI should support healthcare professionals, not replace them

Human knowledge, judgement, and empathy stay at the centre of care. AI can help, but the final decision rests with the clinical team.

Lived-experience involvement means taking part, not just being asked

People affected by lung cancer should help decide what problems AI is used to solve, judge whether the answers meet real needs, and check whether tools deliver what they promised.

These are not standards we ask of others alone. Through our work in the IDERHA and i3Lung projects, our research on large language models in clinical decisions, and the development of our own AI information assistant, we hold ourselves to the same bar.

AI in lung cancer care is moving quickly. Getting it right, for the people it affects, is the work ahead.