Malaysia’s National Heart Institute Is Using AI To Help Doctors Talk To Patients About Survival Odds

Malaysia’s National Heart Institute is teaming up with a local AI firm to build tools that help doctors better explain survival odds to heart patients – starting with the ICU.

Singularity Connect Sdn Bhd and IJN Research Sdn Bhd have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to jointly develop artificial intelligence applications for healthcare, with an initial focus on cardiovascular and thoracic care.

IJN Research is the research arm of the Institut Jantung Negara (National Heart Institute) ecosystem.

The MoU was exchanged on 27 August at the National Innovation and Commercialisation Expo 2026 (NICE 2026) in Kuala Lumpur, an event organised by the Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation and driven by the Malaysian Research Accelerator for Technology and Innovation (MRANTI).

The collaboration pairs Singularity Connect’s Agentic AI capabilities with IJN Research’s clinical expertise and healthcare data. Both sides say the goal is an “outcome-focused, responsibly governed AI platform” to support cardiovascular and thoracic care.

Under the MoU, the two organisations plan to bring together doctors, developers, data scientists, statisticians and bioinformaticians to work on healthcare-focused AI applications. They also intend to explore further collaboration with MRANTI and other innovation partners as projects move from research toward commercial use.

AI Should Support, Not Replace Doctors

Singularity Connect Group CEO Ahmad Fauzi Ali said healthcare AI needs to be built alongside clinical expertise, not deployed on its own.

It needs to be developed alongside deep clinical expertise, real-world healthcare understanding and strong research capabilities.

IJN Research Chief Research & Innovation Officer Prof Dato’ Dr Suhaini Kadiman said AI should support clinicians rather than replace them.

He pointed to IJN’s clinical data systems and its recent HIMSS EMRAM Stage 7 rating, the highest tier of digital maturity for healthcare providers, as a foundation for the partnership.

In an interview, Fauzi said the first area of focus is IJN’s intensive care unit, specifically how doctors communicate survivability odds to patients ahead of procedures for heart failure.

From ICU Conversations to Diagnosis

He said doctors currently weigh a mix of factors, including quality of life, medication and treatment plans, before advising a patient on their options.

The AI platform is meant to give doctors better-organised information and clearer scenario modelling to support those conversations, drawing on IJN’s clinical case data accumulated over more than 10 years.

Fauzi described the project as a world first in cardiovascular AI at this scale – a claim based on IJN’s depth of clinical data and its history as a national referral centre.

Asked whether the collaboration could extend beyond research into diagnosis, Fauzi said that’s an area the group is already looking at. He pointed to FIVA, a Singularity Connect subsidiary focused on primary healthcare, which is working to commercialise AI tools aimed at improving health outcomes for individuals and employees in the primary care space.

For IJN’s ICU patients facing heart failure procedures, that framework could eventually mean a clearer, better-informed conversation about what comes next.