Artificial intelligence in orthopaedics should be built with surgeons, not just for them!
Other text in scientific journal, 2026
Surgical artificial intelligence (AI) is typically validated on one patient population and then deployed unchanged into another, without surgeon input into its design. AI in orthopaedics should be built with surgeons, not simply for them: Surgeons should hold shared authority over the clinical question, data curation, validation, implementation, monitoring and retirement of any tool they use. Specialty-tuned models outperform general-purpose systems on some tasks, but the margin is modest and likely to narrow as generalist models improve. The more durable distinction is who controls the update loop—who can retrain a model on local outcomes, audit its failures and withdraw it when it drifts. Trial evidence shows that a clinician kept in that loop by design, not as an afterthought, outperforms working alone. What determines whether orthopaedic AI fulfils its promise is not model architecture, but who stays accountable to the surgeon at the bedside when the model needs to change.
Author
Felix C. Oettl
University of Zürich
Bálint Zsidai
Sahlgrenska University Hospital
University of Gothenburg
Jacob F. Oeding
University of Gothenburg
Ting Cong
University of Pittsburgh
Elmar Herbst
FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence (FMCE)
Gergely Pánics
Semmelweis University
Uzsoki Street Hospital
FIFA Medical Centre of Excellence (FMCE)
Philipp W. Winkler
University of Gothenburg
Johannes Kepler University of Linz (JKU)
Sahlgrenska University Hospital
Volker Musahl
University of Pittsburgh
Eric Hamrin Senorski
University of Gothenburg
Sahlgrenska University Hospital
Romain Seil
Centre Hospitalier de Luxembourg
Christophe Ley
University of Luxembourg
Yinan Yu
Sahlgrenska University Hospital
Chalmers, Computer Science and Engineering (Chalmers), Functional Programming
University of Gothenburg
Thomas Tischer
University of Rostock
Malteser Waldkrankenhaus Erlangen
Stefano Zaffagnini
IRCCS Istituto Ortopedico Rizzoli, Bologna
Umile Giuseppe Longo
Campus Bio Medico University Hospital
Università Campus Bio-Medico di Roma
Michael T. Hirschmann
Canton Hospital Basel-Land
University of Basel
Michael Hantes
University of Thessaly
Kristian Samuelsson
University of Gothenburg
Sahlgrenska University Hospital
Journal of Experimental Orthopaedics
2197-1153 (eISSN)
Vol. 13 4 e70920Subject Categories (SSIF 2025)
Surgery
DOI
10.1002/jeo2.70920