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Last month, we tackled the missing consensus around AI liability and asked who is responsible when that technology harms a patient. This month, we take that conversation a step further, into agentic AI: what are the risks when the system acts on its own? Could it simply speed up flawed workflows?

Also this month: highlights from a webinar on building a career in digital health alongside a clinical role.
 
Roundtable: agentic AI in healthcare 
BMJ Future Health ran this roundtable, "Agentic AI in healthcare," independently and under the Chatham House Rule, with funding from DNV.  

AI agents are moving out of research labs and into clinical workflows. They raise similar questions to most digital transformations: governance, data ownership, and equity. Clinicians must also contend with inherent AI risks: 

• Hallucinations: it can make things up
• Bias: outputs can be limited by the data it is trained on
• "Black box": we do not fully understand how tools arrive at their conclusions

On 30 June, BMJ Future Health brought together 10 experts with varying perspectives (regulators, NHS quality leaders, policy thinkers, and health technology chief executives) to debate this shift.

The messages were clear:

• AI agents are a chance to rethink health systems to avoid accelerating flawed workflows
• Without investment in data governance, interoperability, and post market surveillance, these innovations will fail to scale
• Build trust through transparency, keep patients in the loop from day one, and target high-impact, low-effort use cases to prove value before the stakes increase.

A full report will be published and available at the October BMJ Future Health event. 

You can contribute to this report by sharing how digital health technologies are shaping healthcare delivery in your practice. Your experiences, including what is not working, will help inform the findings. Complete our survey here.

Question of the month
"How do you build the knowledge and the network to turn an AI concept into a real healthcare innovation?"
A member of the BMJ Future Health community, an NHS consultant, wrote to us with the question above. We ran a webinar on 3 July to answer it. The webinar was not recorded, but here are some key points from one of our attendees on LinkedIn.

"One webinar. Took pages of notes....

Had a great time attending this webinar on building a career in digital health, hosted by BMJ Future Health & Lawrie Kidd.

A few things that stood out to me:

• There’s far more roles than I realised: clinical safety, implementation, transformation, advisory work, non-executive director positions...it goes on!
• Clinicians can bring invaluable insight into how digital products should actually work in practice - you don’t need to be a software engineer
• But one point made me truly see what I’d been underestimating...

Relationships still matter. Face-to-face conversations, conferences, and even grabbing a coffee can open doors and build trust in a way that an online application never will.

There was a real truth in that. Plenty to think about!"

Keep the questions coming. Our inbox stays open, we read what you send, and your feedback shapes what we programme next. Email: cschuster-bruce@bmj.com. 

Could new tests speed up endometriosis diagnosis? Is NHS data safe from US interests? Our monthly reading list is below.
 

Practical skills in handling healthcare data
BMJ Learning has partnered with the University of Cambridge to create a global online programme for busy clinicians. It offers flexible, part time study that builds practical skills in handling healthcare data, with a strong focus on safe and ethical use. Explore the programme.

Stay current in digital health and AI
We have selected these papers from BMJ Group journals to help you keep pace with healthcare innovation.

Research

• Artificial intelligence-guided analysis of the tumor microenvironment predicts response to pembrolizumab in rare tumors.

Review

• Artificial intelligence for child health: current capabilities and the next frontier.
• Advances in systemic therapies for advanced prostate cancer. News

News

• POLITICO's London Playbook newsletter, the Japan Times, Financial Times, Al Jazeera, South China Morning Post, and Indian Express all covered The BMJ’s research on the Australian social media restrictions. 
• Endometriosis: “Game changing” new tests may speed up diagnosis in primary care

Opinion

• The CLOUD Act: NHS data must be safeguarded from US interests.

The topics in this issue (including agentic AI) are ones our community is talking about. If this prompted a thought, a disagreement, or a question of your own, email us here and let us know. We read every response. 

We're also collecting the healthcare problems you're wrestling with until 4 August.

Thank you for reading.