Artificial intelligence (AI) tools aimed at improving citizen health have gained traction in 2025, promising to personalize medical care, speed up diagnoses, facilitate the discovery of new drugs, and much more.
Finland, for example, is using AI to train health workerswhile Estonia applies it to medical data analysis and Spain uses AI for disease detection.
Yet research indicates that AI is not expected to replace healthcare professionals anytime soon: doctors are still outperforming AI in the medical field. emergency settingsand AI chatbots are struggling to solve mental healthproblems and risk propagation medical misinformation.
There is also major security issueswith technology and counterterrorism experts warning that extremists could co-opt AI tools to create biological weapons capable of sparking a pandemic.
Despite everything, AI is increasingly entering the medical field. Here are five ways it has changed the health and well-being of Europeans this year.
1. Predict health risks
Scientists have developed an AI model capable of predicting more than 1,000 health problems– including certain cancers, heart attacks and diabetes – more than a decade before a person is officially diagnosed.
Although it’s not yet ready for use in doctors’ offices, the tool could help researchers understand how diseases develop over time.
At the same time, other AI tools launched this year to predict whether rare genetic mutationswill lead to illness, to be expected risks for women’s heart health by analyzing their mammograms and using routine medical tests to identify biomarkers of chronic stress.
2. Acceleration of disease diagnosis
In a European first, an AI assistant called Prof. Valmed was certified this year to help doctors with diagnosis and treatment, aided by a vast trove of medical data on patients.
Other diagnostic tools are also on the horizon. In the UK, for example, researchers said an AI-powered stethoscope could detect heart disease in just 15 seconds.
The stethoscope was a bit too sensitive, given that further testing ruled out heart failure for about two-thirds of the patients flagged by the stethoscope. However, researchers said the tool also detected real heart problems that otherwise might have gone unnoticed.
Also in the United Kingdomdoctors are using AI to save patients weeks of waiting for a prostate cancer diagnosis.
The AI tool analyzes medical imaging scans and identifies patients at high risk for prostate cancer, sending them to the front of the queue for a radiologist to examine them.
3. Follow-up of patients after operations
A German research team used AI to automate the process of monitoring patients who had coronary stents implanted in open blood vessels blocked due to heart disease. Typically, monitoring the healing process takes time and can lead to further complications.
The AI-based algorithm uses blood vessel imaging to analyze patient healing and is able to quickly distinguish between different healing patterns with a level of accuracy similar to that of expert clinicians. Researchers said the tool could help standardize stent monitoring and improve heart health.
4. Combat antibiotic resistance
Scientists are using AI to combat antibiotic-resistant superbugs, which are a problem growing threat to public health across Europe.
Over the next three years, they plandevelop an AI model to design and test new treatments against drug-resistant bacteria, and will use AI to better understand how the immune system responds to a different type of bacteria in the search for an effective vaccine.
5. Free doctors from administrative work
Medical practices and hospitals across Europe are adopting AI tools to help them manage administrative tasks such as note taking and references. The aim is to give doctors more time with patients amid a growing shortage of healthcare professionals and immense pressures on staff.
Microsoft, for example, made its AI clinical assistant available in Ireland this year, while Swedish company Tandem Health launched its AI-powered medical scribe in Spain, Germany, the UK and Finland. It also operates in the Netherlands, Norway and Denmark.