Rebecca Brendel, Andy Bindman, Carey Goldberg, and Joshua Joseph
Leading experts from across healthcare and technology convened for the second international Responsible AI for Social and Ethical Healthcare (RAISE) Conference on September 17-19, 2025 in Portland, Maine. Co-hosted by Harvard Medical School, MaineHealth, The Roux Institute at Northeastern University, and the New England Journal of Medicine AI, the RAISE Conference drew participants from around the world and across disciplines. Representatives spanned policy, ethics, law, governance, technology, patient advocacy, and clinical practice. Dr. Rebecca Brendel and Dr. Ed Hundert of the HMS Center for Bioethics were among the facilitators.
This year’s symposium focused on the role of clinicians alongside AI developers and ethicists, reflecting the accelerating adoption of AI in healthcare and the complexity of aligning these technologies with human values. Dr. Isaac (Zak) Kohane, the Marion V. Nelson Professor and Chair of the Department of Biomedical Informatics at Harvard Medical School, highlighted this mission in his welcoming remarks, saying:
“The diversity of perspectives represented here is essential: examining artificial intelligence alignment with human values in healthcare requires the full range of voices at the table.”
Over the course of three days, participants engaged with a wide-ranging agenda focused on bringing practical and ethical clarity to AI’s use in clinical care. The conference opened with a fireside discussion between Dr. Ezekiel J. Emanuel and Dr. Zak Kohane on whose values will underpin medical decision-making through the rest of the century. Subsequent sessions featured live debates, scenario enactments such as an ICU dilemma, and robust panel discussions addressing issues including value alignment in AI, the role of professional societies, and the impact of business models on AI deployment in medicine.
Central to the conference was the development of a framework that tests the value systems of AI and the trade-offs of its recommendations in clinical settings. Drs. Brendel and Hundert participated in interactive exercises and working groups, exploring real-life scenarios. They provided valuable insight into how ethical principles and real-world clinical needs can be brought together as AI systems become increasingly common in healthcare.
“Today, physicians, patients and health systems are operating in the dark about what value framework an AI system embodies. At RAISE 2025, a remarkable, interdisciplinary group from around the world met to explore how the ethical values embedded in clinical AI tools could be unpacked, with a view toward making these more explicit. This issue really is one of the frontiers of the intersection of bioethics and the AI revolution in medicine!” - Dr. Rebecca Brendel
Supported by industry leaders including Abridge, AWS, CDW, Microsoft, Palantir, and Virteva / Crossfuze, and set against the innovative backdrop of the Roux Institute, RAISE 2025 provided a uniquely interdisciplinary environment for tackling some of the most pressing questions at the intersection of healthcare and technology. As AI’s role in medicine continues to evolve, gatherings like RAISE are vital for fostering collaboration and building actionable standards to ensure AI ultimately serves the needs and values of patients, clinicians, and society.