Hong Nguyễn, Regional Director, APAC, Wolters Kluwer, speaking at a workshop in Manila on the theme “Leading Healthcare in the AI Era: Keeping Evidence and Trust at the Core.”
As artificial intelligence moves deeper into hospitals, medical schools, and clinical decision-making, Philippine healthcare leaders are focusing on a critical question: can AI be trusted when lives are at stake?
That issue took center stage at a recent Manila workshop organized by Wolters Kluwer with healthcare and academic leaders, where discussions focused on the need to keep evidence, transparency, and professional judgment at the heart of AI adoption.
The conversation comes as the Philippines continues to face severe healthcare workforce shortages and uneven access to medical services, particularly outside major urban centers.
The country has only about four doctors for every 10,000 people, well below the World Health Organization benchmark of 10. Only two of the Philippines’ 17 regions meet the recommended doctor-to-population standard, while the EDCOM II Report for 2026 estimates a nationwide shortage of around 290,000 healthcare professionals.
These gaps translate into heavier workloads for doctors and nurses, longer patient waiting times, and persistent disparities in healthcare access between Metro Manila and many provincial communities.
Against this backdrop, artificial intelligence is increasingly being explored as a tool that could help clinicians access medical information faster, support learning, and improve clinical workflows.
But healthcare leaders stressed that speed alone is not enough.
For AI to be useful in medicine, the information it provides must be current, traceable, evidence-based, and open to independent review. Human oversight also remains crucial, particularly when AI-generated information is used to support clinical decisions.
At the workshop, titled “Leading Healthcare in the AI Era: Keeping Evidence and Trust at the Core,” participants examined how generative AI could reshape medical education, clinical training, and healthcare delivery without weakening the role of doctors and other medical professionals.
Wolters Kluwer also presented UpToDate® Expert AI, a generative AI experience built on the evidence-based medical content of UpToDate.
The platform allows healthcare professionals to ask clinical questions using natural language and review AI-generated responses alongside the underlying medical content supporting those answers.
Its design places emphasis on transparency, allowing users to check the sources behind the information rather than relying blindly on an automated response.
The company stressed that the technology is intended to support clinical learning and reasoning—not replace the judgment of physicians.
Healthcare institutions in the Philippines are already beginning to evaluate how evidence-grounded generative AI could help improve access to trusted medical knowledge.
Among publicly announced organizations exploring such technologies are The Medical City, Jose R. Reyes Memorial Medical Center, and Makati Medical Center.
More than 45 institutions across the country, including hospitals, medical schools, and the Department of Health, also use Wolters Kluwer clinical solutions to support medical education and evidence-based practice.
Hong Nguyễn, Regional Director for Asia-Pacific at Wolters Kluwer, said the usefulness of AI in healthcare will ultimately depend on the credibility of the information behind it.
“Artificial intelligence has significant potential to support healthcare professionals, but its value ultimately depends on the quality and reliability of the information behind its responses,” Nguyễn said.
She added that clinicians must be able to determine where AI-generated information comes from, whether it reflects the latest medical evidence, and whether its conclusions can be independently evaluated.
“Technology should be grounded in the best available evidence and used alongside the clinician’s expertise, experience, and professional judgment,” Nguyễn said.
As AI becomes increasingly embedded in healthcare systems, the emerging challenge for hospitals and medical schools may no longer be simply whether to adopt the technology.
The bigger question is how to use it without sacrificing the trust, accountability, and clinical judgment that remain fundamental to patient care.